Cultivation Regions

Sometimes called agricultural regions, cultivation regions are units of territory associated with a specific type of agricultural activity. This activity can involve the actual tilling of the land or can be some type of animal husbandry. Cultivation regions emerge due to both cultural and environmental factors.

A region of shifting cultivation, often labeled “slash and burn” agriculture, is found in tropical and subtropical climates in Latin America, Africa, and Southeast Asia. Fields are prepared here by killing the natural vegetation and then burning away the dead material. The ash residue from the burnt vegetation helps to enrich the tropical soil, which is typically tilled and planted by hand with food crops. One type of crop is often planted between the rows of another crop, in a system of intertillage. Once the soil is exhausted farmers “shift” to another location and repeat the process.

Plantation cultivation is also associated with tropical or subtropical climates. This system is focused on the production of a single commercial crop, such as coffee, tea, palm oil, cotton, tobacco, or others. Historically, this form of cultivation relied on abundant, cheap labor, but many modern plantations have incorporated machinery into the production of their crops. Plantations are usually located close to road, rail, or water transport, because much of the production is typically grown for export. Crops may be refined or processed on the plantation before being sent to markets.

Yet a third cultivation region found primarily in the tropics is rice paddy cultivation. This is a labor-intensive style of agriculture, and has been widely mechanized only in areas lying outside the tropics, like Japan and the lower Mississippi River valley in the United States. In the tropical climates of South and Southeast Asia, fields are small and prepared using draft animals. Most rice production is for subsistence in the tropics, and typically two crops are produced in a single year, a practice called double-cropping.