APHG Unit Five Vocabulary

Term / Definition / Example / Illustration (in color)
Primary Activity / economic activity concerned with the direct extraction of natural resources from the environment; such as mining, fishing, lumbering, and especially agriculture
Secondary Activity / economic activity involving the processing of raw materials and their transformation into finished industrial products; the manufacturing sector
Tertiary Activity / economic activity associated with the provision of services (transportation, banking, retailing, education, routine, office-based jobs)
Pre-Industrial Societies / refers to social attributes and forms of political and cultural organization that were prevalent before the advent of the Industrial Revolution
Quaternary Activities / service sector industries concerned with the collection, processing, and manipulation of information and capital (finance, administration, insurance, legal services)
Post-Industrial Societies / countries where people are no longer employed in industry
Agriculture / the purposeful tending of crops and livestock in order to produce food and fiber
Term / Definition / Example / Illustration (in color)
Hunters and Gatherers / a nomadic society in which most or all food is obtained from wild plants and animals, in contrast to agricultural societies, which rely mainly on domesticated species.
Neolithic Revolution / Dating back 10,000 years, the First Agricultural Revolution achieved plant domestication and animal domestication
Agricultural Hearths / where farming practices diffuse from
Vegetative Planting / earliest from of plant cultivation, cutting/planting old plants to make new ones
Seed Agriculture / production of plants through annual planting of seed, came later, most farmers today practice this
Plant and Animal Domestication / genetic modification of plants and animals in such that it is rendered more amenable to human control
Irrigation / the artificial application of water to the land or soil
Yields / to give forth or produce by a natural process or in return for cultivation
Term / Definition / Example / Illustration (in color)
Enclosure Movement / fencing/hedging large blocks of land for experiments with new techniques of farming, began early 1700s
Transhumance / The seasonal migration of livestock between mountains and lowland pastures
Crop Rotation / carefully controls nutrients in soil
Seed Drill / by JethroTull, planted seeds more efficiently
Less Developed Countries / also known as a developing country, a country that is at a relatively early stage in the process of economic development
More Developed Countries / also known as a relatively developed country of a developed country, a country that has progressed relatively far along a continuum of development
Subsistence Agriculture / prevalent in LDCs, production of enough food to feed farmer's family, no/little surplus to sell
Commercial Agriculture / production of food surpluses practice mainly in more developed countries, sells to food processing companies
Term / Definition / Example / Illustration (in color)
Agribusiness / General term for the businesses that provide the vast array of goods and services that support the agriculture industry
Intensive Subsistence Agriculture / self sufficient agriculture that is small scale and low technology & emphasizes food production for local consumption, not trade
Wet Rice / planted on dry land in a nursery, then moved as seedling to a flood field to promote growth, requires lots of time and attention, but under ideal conditions can provide large amount of food/unit of land
Labor Intensive Agriculture / Requiring or using a large supply of labor
Shifting Cultivation / cultivation of crops in tropical forest clearings in which the forest vegetation has been removed by cutting and burning
“Slash and Burn” / cultivation of crops in tropical forest clearings in which the forest vegetation has been removed by cutting and burning
Swidden Agriculture / an area of land cleared for cultivation by slashing and burning vegetation.
Intertillage / growing various types of crops, common in shifting cultivation
Term / Definition / Example / Illustration (in color)
Potash / any of various mined and manufactured salts that contain potassium in water-soluble form.
Pastoral Nomadism / A type of agricultural activity based on nomadic animal husbandry or the raising of livestock to provide food, clothing, and shelter.
Nomadism / a lifestyle adapted to infertile regions such as steppe, tundra, or ice and sand, where mobility is the most efficient strategy for exploiting scarce resources
Second Agricultural Revolution / dovetailing with and benefiting from the Industrial Revolution, improved methods of cultivation, harvesting, and storage of farm produce
Extensive Subsistence Agriculture / shifting cultivation and pastoral nomadism, involves large areas of land and minimal labor, population densities low.
Extensive Commercial Agriculture / involves large areas of land and minimal labor; includes ranching and farming cereal grains
Intensive Commercial Agriculture / any kind of agriculture activity that involves effective and efficient use of labor on small plots of land to maximize crop yield
Mixed Crop and Livestock Farming / farmers grow crops and raise livestock on same land spread, with crops fed to animals, most income from sales of animal products
Term / Definition / Example / Illustration (in color)
Crop Rotation / each field planted on a planned cycle
Dairy Farms / outlying urban areas, products feed cities across US, W Europe. SE Canada, must be closer to their market
Milkshed / ring of milk production surrounding a city
Grain Farming / heavily mechanized, labor concentrated during planting/harvesting seasons, world's leading export crop
Livestock Ranching / the raising of domesticated animals for the production of meat and byproducts (leather, wool)
Mediterranean Agriculture / specialized farming that occurs only in areas where the dry summer Mediterranean climate prevails
Horticulture / growing of fruits, vegetables, flowers, tree crops, forms commercial base of Mediterranean farming
Truck Farming / commercial fruit farming and gardening
Term / Definition / Example / Illustration (in color)
Plantations / Production system based on a large estate owned by an individual, family, or corporation and organized to produce a cash crop. Almost all plantations were established within the tropics
Von Thunen Model / depending on the cost of transportation and the value of hte product, different types of farming are conducted at different distances from a city.
Women in Agriculture / Initiatives that not only address gender equality and the specialized needs of women in agriculture, but also create accountability for delivering on these commitments.
Perishable Crops / Items, especially foodstuffs, that are subject to decay or spoilage
Commercial Crops / term used to describe large scale farming and ranching operations that employ vast land bases, large mechanized equipment, factory-type labor forces, and the latest technology
Dispersed Settlements / individual farmhouses lie quite far apart; also exist where machinery makes intensive cultivation over large areas possible
Nucleated Settlements / villages located quite close together with relatively small surrounding fields; intensive land use, but people and animals do the work; most common type of settlement worldwide
Hamlets / small clusters of buildings
Term / Definition / Example / Illustration (in color)
Villages / small number of people who live in a cluster of houses in a rural area
Wattle / poles and sticks woven tightly together and then covered with mud
Round Villages / traditional style found in East Africa and parts of Europe, and it features houses that circle around a central corral for animals, with fields extending outside the ring of houses
Walled Villages / developed in ancient days in order to protect villagers from attack, often surrounded by moats
Grid Villages / modern village type laid out in straight street patterns that run in parallel and perpendicular lines
Linear Villages / modern village type that follow major roads, often one single thoroughfare lined with houses, businesses, and public buildings
Cluster Villages / have more than one major road that they build along, and they also have housing that clusters around large public buildings, such as churches, temples, mosques, livestock corrals, or grain bins
Primogeniture / system where the eldest son in a family, or in exceptional cases, a daughter inherits all of the parent's land
Term / Definition / Example / Illustration (in color)
Survey Methods / systems that are used to collect data
Metes and Bounds Approach / A system of land surveying east of the Appalachian Mountains. It is a system that relies on descriptions of land ownership and natural features such as streams or trees.
Long-Lot Survey System / distinct regional approach to land surveying found in the Canadian Maritimes, parts of Quebec, Louisiana, and Texas whereby land is divided into narrow parcels stretching back from rivers, roads, or canals
Mercantilism / private companies under charter from the governments carrying out the trade
Metes and Bounds / land survey where natural features are used to mark irregular parcels of land
Industrial Agriculture / characterized by a low fallow ratio and higher use of inputs such as capital and labor per unit land area.
Specialization / the growing of specialized crops because they seem to be more profitable
Term / Definition / Example / Illustration (in color)
Third Agricultural Revolution / Currently in progress, the Third Agricultural Revolution has as its principal orientation the development of Genetically Modified Organisms (GMO's)
Biotechnology / use of genetically altered crops in agriculture and DNA manipulation in livestock to increase population; began with hybrid rice which led to "IR8" cross of Chinese and Indonesian
Miracle Grains / Seeds that produce better yield, greater uniformity, improved color,disease resistance
Green Revolution / the development of higher-yield and fast-growing crops through increased technology, pesticides, and fertilizers transferred from the developed to developing world to alleviate the problem of food supply in those regions of the globe.
Overgrazing / occurs when plants are exposed to intensive grazing for extended periods of time, or without sufficient recovery periods
Overplanting / to plant more than is necessary or possible to sustain
Desertification / when land is overgrazed and overplanted and eventually is no longer arable land; where this occurred is Sub-Saharan Africa, the Sahara Desert gained more and more land space
Term / Definition / Example / Illustration (in color)
Food Deserts / parts of the country vapid of fresh fruit,vegetables, and other healthful whole foods, usually found in impoverished areas. This is largely due to a lack of grocery stores, farmers' markets, and healthy food providers.
Genetically Modified Organisms / crops that carry new traits that have been inserted through advanced genetic engineering methods
Koppen Classification System / Developed by WladimirKoppen, a system for classifying the world's climates on the basis of temperature and precipitation
Luxury Crops / Non-subsistence crops such as tea, cacao, coffee, and tobacco
Monoculture / dependence on a single agricultural commodity
Aquaculture / the cultivation and harvesting of aquatic organisms under controlled conditions
Root Crops / crops that are reproduced by cultivating either the roots or cuttings from the plants
Organic Agriculture / approach to farming and ranching that avoids the use of herbicides, pesticides, growth hormones, and other similar synthetic inputs

Von Thunen Model Of Agricultural Land UseAgricultural Hearths