Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
from foreign corporations to landless citizens at a low
appraised value. The United Fruit Company, an American
fi rm with extensive holdings in the country, was greatly
concerned by this turn of events. The company had close
ties to powerful individuals in the American government,
including Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, CIA
director Allen Dulles (the two were brothers), and Assistant
Secretary of State for Inter-American Affairs John Moors
Cabot. In 1954, the United States supported the over-
throw of the government of Guatemala because of stated
concerns about the spread of communism. This ended all
land reform initiatives, however, leading many commenta-
tors to question the degree to which the United Fruit
Company was behind the coup. Indeed, with the exception
of President Dwight Eisenhower, every individual involved
in the decision to help topple Guatemala's government had
ties to the company. This example illustrates the inextrica-
ble links between economics and political motivations—
and it raises questions about the degree to which multina-
tional corporations based in wealthy countries infl uence
decisions about politics, agriculture, and land reform in
other parts of the world.
domesticated animals for the production of meat and by-
products, such as leather and wool. In addition to the large
cattle-ranching areas in the United States, Canada, and
Mexico, much of eastern Brazil and Argentina are devoted
to ranching, along with large tracts of Australia and New
Zealand, as well as South Africa. You may see a Thünian
pattern here: livestock ranching on the periphery and con-
sumers in the cities. Refrigeration has overcome the prob-
lem of perishability, and high volume has lowered the unit
cost of transporting beef, lamb, and other animal products.
Subsistence Agriculture
The map of world agriculture labels three types of subsis-
tence agriculture: subsistence crop and livestock farming;
intensively subsistence farming (chiefl y rice); and inten-
sively subsistence farming (chiefl y wheat and other crops).
In some regions that are labeled as subsistence, that label
does not tell the whole story. For example, in Southeast
Asia, rice is grown on small plots and is labor-intensive, so
that subsistence and export production occur side by side.
Despite the region's signifi cant rice exports, most
Southeast Asian farmers are subsistence farmers. Thus,
Southeast Asia appears on the map as primarily a subsis-
tence grain-growing area.
Commercial Livestock, Fruit,
and Grain Agriculture
As Figure 11.18 shows, by far the largest areas of commer-
cial agriculture (1 through 4 in the legend) lie outside the
tropics. Dairying (1) is widespread at the northern mar-
gins of the midlatitudes—particularly in the northeastern
United States and in northwestern Europe. Fruit, truck,
and specialized crops (2), including the market gardens
von Thünen observed around Rostock, are found in the
eastern and southeastern United States and in widely dis-
persed small areas where environments are favorable. In
Central Asia and the Sahara, major oases stand out as
commercial agriculture on the map.
Mixed livestock and crop farming (3) is widespread in
the more humid parts of the midlatitudes, including much of
the eastern United States, western Europe, and western
Russia, but it is also found in smaller areas in Uruguay, Brazil,
and South Africa. Commercial grain farming (4) prevails in
the drier parts of the midlatitudes, including the southern
Prairie Provinces of Canada, in the Dakotas and Montana in
the United States, as well as in Nebraska, Kansas, and adja-
cent areas. Spring wheat (planted in the spring and harvested
in the summer) grows in the northern zone, and winter
wheat (planted in the autumn and harvested in the spring of
the following year) is used in the southern area. An even
larger belt of wheat farming extends from Ukraine through
Russia into Kazakhstan. The Argentinean and Australian
wheat zones are smaller in area, but their exports are an
important component of world trade.
Even a cursory glance at Figure 11.18 reveals the wide
distribution of
livestock ranching
(12), the raising of
Mediterranean Agriculture
Only one form of agriculture mentioned in the legend
of Figure 11.18 refers to a particular climatic zone:
Mediterranean agriculture
(6). As the map shows, this
kind of specialized farming occurs only in areas where the
dry summer Mediterranean climate prevails (Fig. 11.17):
along the shores of the Mediterranean Sea, in parts of
California and Oregon, in central Chile, at South Africa's
Cape, and in parts of southwestern and southern Australia.
Farmers here grow a special combination of crops: grapes,
olives, citrus fruits, fi gs, certain vegetables, dates, and oth-
ers. From these areas come many wines; these and other
commodities are exported to distant markets because
Mediterranean products tend to be popular and command
high prices.
Drug Agriculture
There are important agricultural activities that cannot
easily be mapped at the global scale and therefore do not
appear in Figure 11.18. One of those is the cultivation of
crops that are turned into illegal drugs. Because of the
high demand for drugs—particularly in the global eco-
nomic core—farmers in the periphery often fi nd it more
profi table to cultivate poppy, coca, or marijuana plants
than to grow standard food crops. Cultivation of these
plants has increased steadily over the past several decades,
and they now constitute an important source of revenue
