In Colombia's agricultural lands, altitude determines the types of crops farmers grow. Coffee revenues generated by Colombia's growers are the second highest in the world and account for half of the country's legal exports. At these altitudes, farmers cultivate other important commercial crops, such as sugar cane. Ornamental flowers have also become an important agricultural export commodity. Over the past 30 years, Colombia's flower industry has grown dramatically and is now the world's second largest after the Netherlands.
Farmers grow potatoes, grains and some garden vegetables.
Livestock producers use the land for pasture. In Colombia, civil war has severely compromised development through its highland areas. These civil conflicts, involving the government, the army, the police, paramilitary organizations, several guerrilla movements and drug traffickers have forced hundreds of thousands of rural people from their homes. Most of these internal refugees have moved to sprawling slums around big cities. Others have joined previous generations of refugees in the southern and eastern lowland forests where some cultivate illicit drug crops or become otherwise employed in the country's drug economy.