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Historical Agricultural Contributions in America

Kien Lai | AG 101 | 4/00/02 | California State Polytechnic University, Pomona

Agricultural Contributions

Discuss the unique important historical circumstances, which contributed to the U.S. becoming the worlds leading agricultural country.

The success of America becoming the worlds leading agricultural country is the result of several historical events that have extended over thousands of years. Although each event provided only a gradual change in the cultivation of agriculture, the sum of these individual contributions have set the foundation for all that is agriculture today. The efforts of past civilizations, Native Americans, Spanish, and Europeans have all influenced the positive direction of agriculture in America that has greatly benefited future generations by enable them to sustain larger populations.

Past civilizations have greatly contributed to the success of sustainable agriculture. The Incas, as discussed in class, populated Central America between 2500 B.C. and 1500 B.C. with a population of more than 15 million people during its peak. The large population demonstrates the Incas ability to utilize their surroundings for agricultural purposes. Through many years of observation, the society was able to learn the cycles of plant life and implement various techniques to increase their yields in harvesting. Innovations include exploiting mountain ranges by creating tariffs, which provided areas for planting crops.

Complimentary to planting corps, the Incas also realized composting helped revitalized the soil after harvesting, which made planting crops the following year favorable in increasing their yields. According to Hurt, the Mayas also used similar farming techniques. Although slightly different from composting, the idea behind sustainable agriculture remains intact. The Mayas used what was known as the slash and burn method in letting the land reinstate its former conditions. This method of crop rotation proved effective in supporting the large Mayas population. The Aztecs, however, were far more advanced in terms of innovation. Based on class discussions and notes, they pioneered the control of water through arrogation methods by the use of underground tunnels to transport water, thus enabling them to move farther inland.

The arrival of the Spanish explorer Pizarro forever changed the landscape of American agriculture. By importing various fruits and vegetables for farming, the Spanish introduced . The domestication of various animals that were brought from Spain.