Farming

Farming has been a cornerstone of our society since man first realised the potential to cultivate the land and domesticate animals. Nearly all the food that we eat will have been a product of farming of some variety. Farming provided us with cereals, fruits, vegetables and meat, plus other non edible goods such as lumber, plants used to make textiles and tobacco. Farming is a fundamental aspect of society and has been since history was first recorded.

Advances in technology have had a significant effect on the manner in which farming is undertaken and the methods employed in farming have evolved significantly over time. The mechanization of farming was possibly one of the most significant advances made in farming and the use of tractors to pull ploughs and combine harvesters to gather crops has seen the rate at which food can be produced using farming increased significantly. Crop rotation methods and the use of fertilisers has enabled farmers to produce crops of a very high yield economically.

The methods used for the farming of livestock has changed greatly over the course of time and the intensive farming, despite the controversy that, of poultry and livestock is common place and is used to produce significant quantities of inexpensive meat. Intensive factory farming has been subject to controversies for many years, although recently the there has been a great deal of reports in the press concerning the inhuman methods of intensive farming utilises and the poor conditions factory farmed animals suffer.