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An example of an ecosystem service is pollination, here by a honey bee on avocado crop. Ecosystem services are the various benefits that humans derive from healthy ecosystems. These ecosystems, when functioning well, offer such things as provision of food, natural pollination of crops, clean air and water, decomposition of wastes, or flood ...
Water harvesting is one of the largest and most common practices, particularly used in dry areas and seasons. In Ethiopia, over half of their GDP and over 80 percent of their exports are attributed to agriculture; yet, it is known for its intense droughts and dry periods. [155] Rain water harvesting is considered to be a low-cost alternative.
Alley cropping of maize and sweet chestnut, Dordogne, France Maize grown under Faidherbia albida and Borassus akeassii near Banfora, Burkina Faso. Agroforestry (also known as agro-sylviculture or forest farming) is a land use management system that integrates trees with crops or pasture.
Horticulture is the art and science of growing fruits, vegetables, flowers, trees, shrubs and ornamental plants. Horticulture is commonly associated with the more professional and technical aspects of plant cultivation on a smaller and more controlled scale than agronomy.
A four-ox-team plough, circa 1330. The ploughman is using a mouldboard plough to cut through the heavy soils. A team could plough about one acre (0.4 ha) per day. The typical planting scheme in a three-field system was that barley, oats, or legumes would be planted in one field in spring, wheat or rye in the second field in the fall and the third field would be left fallow.
Agricultural monocultures refer to the practice of planting one crop species in a field. [15] Monoculture is widely used in intensive farming and in organic farming.In crop monocultures, each plant in a field has the same standardized planting, maintenance, and harvesting requirements resulting in greater yields and lower costs.
A significant part of the energy cost of industrial food production arises from the packaging and shipping of products to the increasingly urban consumer base. [6] The energy costs, pesticide use, and widespread erosion implicit in many forms of industrial food production have led to concerns about its long-term sustainability as a pattern of ...
More than 90% of rural households have access to land, yet most of these poor have insufficient access to food. [20] Subsistence agriculture can be used in low-income countries as a part of policy responses to a food crisis in the short and medium term and provide a safety net for the poor in these countries. [20]