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agricultural change — English
Different alterations in land husbandry and land-use practices have occurred in all food-producing systems in all parts of the world over the past few thousand years. The most dramatic and far-reaching changes have been the so-called agricultural revolution of some 10 000 to 12 000 years ago when people abandoned their nomadic lifestyles and started to settle in specific locations where they had to produce all their food themselves and surpluses could be bartered with neighbouring groups of people. This is when agriculture in the true sense of the word was born. People had to learn how to produce crops year after year on the same land and develop methods of animal husbandry and sustainable crop cultivation. The second most influential agricultural change happened during the so-called “green revolution” in the1950s when scientifically bred or selected animal breeds and varieties of wheat, rice and maize where introduced in order to increase food production. These variant species of grain greatly increased the world’s food production (see “food security”). New variants are still being bred and pest control is perpetually improving, so that world food production is continually increasing. Yet some populations in certain countries are more or less continually experiencing famine or near-famine (see “vulnerability”). In many regions agricultural changes in the form of converting to altogether different types of agriculture and production have happened or are taking place. In certain regions of Zambia, maize is being replaced by cotton which is a more profitable cash crop, and in certain regions of South Africa game farming is fast replacing cattle farming. In many respects certain species of game are less expensive to keep than cattle and since the farming sector in South Africa is not subsidised anymore as it is in the USA and the countries of the European Union, many South African farmers are changing from crop cultivation to animal husbandry and game farming. Ostrich farming has more or less replaced sheep farming in parts of the Klein Karoo region. How successful these changes have been will only be clear in a few years from now, as at the time of writing, the outcome of this agricultural change is still unpredictable.
