Larger farms buy or force them out. Inadequate domestic production and the dependence on food imports can also result in local food shortages and higher prices that increase food insecurity for many people living in poverty. In addition, when many countries try to export the same products, their prices fall. Producers and workers in poor countries earn less. As a result, countries have heavily overused soil to grow cash crops.
Farmers are under pressure to produce more crops on small areas of land.
They often apply heavy doses of expensive chemical fertilizers that degrade the soil. Vital natural resources are depleted. Fish stocks are damaged through overfishing. Forests often are cut down by national or multinational companies, displacing local people. Mineral resources are exploited by mining companies that often dump toxic tailings in local water supplies, destroying nearby lands in the process.