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12.000 BC
– Africa |
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In pre-historic
times, around the year 12000 B.C., the first forms of
agriculture (domestication of some vegetable species) and
cattle raising (domestication of animals) appeared, together
with the first forms of agriculturist villages. In this period,
the use of fire and of some tools, as well as of animal manure,
became a part of the daily life of the urban agglomerates that
gave birth to cities. |
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Brazil –
Before its discovery |
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In Brazil,
before the coming of the Portuguese, the indian population
living along the coastal areas would feed basically on fish
and shelfish, abundant in the Brazilian coast. The
alimentary residues thus resulting became fossils known as
sambaquis. They also consumed roots (manioc, yams) and
hunted little animals in the areas close to the woods.
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The 16th
and 17th centuries/Brazil |
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Since the 16th
century, European colonizers have devastated the Brazilian
coastal vegetation, beginning with the export of redwood,
used as raw material for the tinting of textiles. Later,
through cultures for export ("plantations") like
sugar-cane, followed by extensive cattle raising, through
the gold cycles up to the coffee exploration. All of the
economy was directed towards exportation. A continent
untouched for millions of years was extremely fertile for
any kind of agriculturist exploration. Even because, as
written by Pero Vaz de Caminha in his letter to Portugal,
this was a land "...where you harvest whatever you
plant". |
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The 18th
and 19th centuries/Europe |
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The
population growth and the decrease in soil fertility due to
years of exploring successive cultures in the European
continent have caused, among other problems, the scarcity of
food. This led to the adoption, between the 17th
and 19th centuries, of a rotation system of
cultures with the use of fodder (grass and leguminosae), and
the integration of agriculturist and cattle raising
activities. This phase is known as The First
Agriculturist Revolution.
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The 19th
century/Europe |
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In the end of the 19th and
beginning of the 20th century, the problems of
chronic scarcity of food in European soils are aggravated,
which leads to a series of scientific and technologic
discoveries: chemical fertilizers, genetic improvement,
machines and combustion engines. These discoveries made
possible the progressive forsaking of old practices, obliging
the agriculturists to become specialized, in cultures as well
as in cattle raising.
Thus began a new phase in the systems of
agriculture and stock raising, in which the manner to conceive
and manage rural activity is called Industrial Agriculture
(IA), Conventional Agriculture or Chemical Agriculture. This
phase is called The Second Agricultural Revolution.
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The 19th
century/Brazil |
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In the mid-18th and in the 19th
centuries, after the continuous growth of export agriculture (such
as sugar-cane), blended with the expansion of coffee
plantations throughout mountains and valleys of the province
of Rio de Janeiro, some evident signs that Brazilian
agriculture was facing a crisis began to appear. This crisis
was chiefly attributed to the lack of hands (caused by the end
of slavery) and of capital, besides the technical and
administrative backwardness of the agriculturists in
conducting their business. |
Most landowners
believed in the extensive exploration of the production
systems through the expansion of agricultural frontiers,
letting go the plantations that were not satisfactorily
productive and moving to other areas, which reinitiated the
cycle of exploitation of the soil’s fertility. This was the
nomad culture of Brazilian soil expropriation, in which little
thought was given to the negative consequences of the
mishandling of agriculture and stock raising, especially what
concerned forest destruction.
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