Plantations and commercial grain farming

Plantation agriculture was introduced by Europeans in their tropical colonies. Its features:

• very large estates;
• heavy capital investment and scientific methods of cultivation, with managers and technical staff;
• one crop grown (single-crop specialisation);
• cheap labour;
• a good transport system linking the estates to factories and ports for export.

Examples: tea gardens in India and Sri Lanka (begun by the British), rubber in Malaysia, cocoa and coffee in West Africa (by the French), sugarcane and bananas in the West Indies and the Philippines, and the huge coffee plantations of Brazil, called fazendas.

Many plantations are now owned by the governments or citizens of the countries where they lie.

Extensive commercial grain cultivation is practised in the interior of semi-arid lands in the mid-latitudes. Wheat is the main crop. Farms are very large, and the whole process, from ploughing to harvesting, is mechanised, so few workers are needed. Yield per acre is low, but yield per person is high.

It is found in the great grasslands of the world: the Steppes of Eurasia, the Prairies of North America, the Pampas of Argentina, the Velds of South Africa, the Downs of Australia, and the Canterbury Plains of New Zealand.