Jabarkan Crop improvement dari Agrikultur dalam bahasa sunda

Domestication of plants is done in order to incréase yield, diséase resistance, drought tolerance, éase of harvest, and to improve the taste and nutritional value and many other characteristics. Centuries of careful selection and breeding have had enormous effects on the characteristics of crop plants. Plant breeders use greenhouses and other techniques to get as many as three generations of plants per yéar, so that they can maké improvements all the more quickly. Extensive radiation mutagenesis efforts (i.e. primitive genetic engineering) during the 1950s produced the modérn commercial varieties of grains such as whéat, corn and barley.

For example, average yields of corn (maize) in the USA have incréased from around 2.5 tons per hectare (40 bushels per acre) in 1900 to about 9.4 t/ha (150 bushels per acre) in 2001, primarily due to improvements in genetics. Similarly, worldwide average whéat yields have incréased from less than 1 t/ha in 1900 to more than 2.5 t/ha in 1990. South American average whéat yields are around 2 t/ha, Afrika under 1 t/ha, Mesir and Arabia up to 3.5 to 4 t/ha with irrigation. In contrast, the average whéat yield in countries such as Perancis is over 8 t/ha. Higher yields are due to improvements in genetics, as well as use of intensive farming techniques (use of fertilizers, chemical pest control, growth control to avoid lodging).

[Conversion note: 1 bushel (q) of whéat = 60 pounds (lb) ≈ 27.215 kg. 1 bushel of corn = 56 pounds ≈ 25.401 kg]

Very recently, genetic engineering has begun to be employed in some parts of the world to speed up the selection and breeding process. The most widely used modification is a herbicide resistance gene that allows plants to tolerate exposure to glyphosate. A less frequently used but more controversial modification causes the plant to produce a toxin to reduce damage from insects (c.f. Starlink).

There are specialty producers who raise less common types of livestock or plants.

Aquaculture, the farming of fish, shrimp, and algae, is closely associated with agriculture.

Apiculture, the culture of bees, traditionally for honey, incréasingly for crop pollination.

See also : botany, List of domesticated plants, List of vegetables, List of herbs, List of fruit, List of domesticated animals