The document discusses different types of activities in the primary sector of the economy, which includes agriculture, livestock farming, fishing, and forestry. It provides details on various forms of agriculture including subsistence, commercial, plantation, and intensive/extensive systems. Livestock is also summarized, distinguishing traditional, commercial extensive and intensive animal husbandry. The primary sector makes up over 30% of the world's workforce but varies significantly between developed and developing countries.

1. PRIMARY SECTOR

2. It includes all the activities related to
the extraction of natural resources
from nature: agriculture,
stockbreeding, fishing and forest
logging.
Nowadays 33.5% of the world
population works in the primary
sector, but there are important
differences between the developed
and the developing countries. In the
developed countries less than 10%
of the working population work in
the primary sector, while in the
developing countries more than 40%
of the working population work in it.
PRIMARY SECTOR

3. Factors that affect agriculture
- Physical factors: related to the physical
conditions, such as climate, relief and the
quality of the soil.
- Climate: every crop needs a specific
amount of water and heat
- Relief: plain areas are better than
mountainous areas to cultivate and
harvest.
- Quality of the soil: not all soils have the
same fertility. The best soils are those that
have more nutrients.
- Human factors: related to human intervention
in the soil. The main human factors are
economy and technological development. These
factors are usually related: the more developed
a society is, the more technologically developed
it becomes.
Agriculture is the economic activity that consists in cultivating the land to use the
products it gives.
AGRICULTURE OR FARMING

4. AGRARIAN LANDSCAPES
The agrarian landscape is the
natural landscape that has been
modified to obtain products
through agriculture. The main
elements of agrarian landscapes
are:
- plots of land
- farming systems
- habitat

5. A plot of land is a piece of land dedicated
to agriculture. Plots of land can be
classified depending on their size, their
shape and their limits.
o Size: large estates (big plots of land,
more than 100 hectares), small
estates (small plots of land,
between 0 and 10 hectares)
o Shape: plots can be regular (with
geometric shape) or irregular.
o Limits: plots can be open (open
fields), if there is no physical
separation between the fields, or
closed (enclosures or bocages), if
there are walls, fences or hedges
that separate the fields.
PLOTS OF LAND

7. FARMING SYSTEMS
Farming systems can be classified depending
on the variety of crops, the quantity of
water the crops need and the quantity of
investment made.
o Variety of crops:
 Monoculture: growing one single
crop over a wide area.
 Multiple cropping or polyculture:
growing different crops in the same
space.
o Quantity of water needed:
 Irrigated crops: crops that need an
extra amount of water to grow.
 Non- irrigated or dry- land crops:
crops that can grow only with rain
water.

9. SURFACE IRRIGATION/FLOOD IRRIGATION SPRINKLER IRRIGATION
DRIP IRRIGATION

10. o Quantity of work and investment made:
 Intensive agriculture: This type of
agriculture is usual in highly populated
places with not much space available. The
objective of this type of agriculture is to
produce the largest quantity of products in
the least space available. This requires
important investments in work,
techniques (fertilizers, seeds´ selection)
and workers.
 Extensive agriculture: This type of
agriculture is usual in sparsely populated
places with large extensions of land
available and scarce number of workers.
The main aim of this type of agriculture is
to produce big amounts of low-cost
products. Machines are usual in this type
of agriculture.

11. SCATTERED COMMUNITY
Rural habitats can be scattered (if the dwellings are far apart and disseminated
among the fields) or concentrated (if the dwellings are close together in the same
place).
HABITAT
CONCENTRATED COMMUNITY

12. SUBSISTENCE AGRICULTURE
This type of agriculture is oriented to
satisfy the basic necessities of the
farmers. Farmers produce all they need
to survive. Production is used for self-
consumption (only to feed the farmers
and their families), techniques are
rudimentary and farmers work with their
hands or with simple tools, like hoes,
ploughs and digging sticks. Sometimes
they use animals to help them (oxen,
horses, donkeys). Production is low and
there is little surplus to sell in the
market. It´s a self-sufficient agriculture.
This type of agriculture is practiced by
2/3 of the world working population
(more than 1,000 million people),
especially in Africa, Asia and South
America.

13. SLASH AND BURN AGRICULTURE
It consists of cutting and
burning forests or
woodlands to create fields
for agriculture. Between
200 and 500 million farmers
in the world practice this
agriculture. The fields are
fertile for 4-5 years. This is
the reason why the farmers
have to leave the lands and
start again in a different
place.
This type of agriculture is practiced in equatorial and tropical areas of South
America, Africa and South Asia.

14. EXTENSIVE DRY-LAND AGRICULTURE
This type of agriculture is the most
common in the dry areas of Africa. It
consists of an association of farming
and stockbreeding. Farmers use the
three- year system of crop rotation,
leaving one part fallow. Fallow is used
to feed cattle. Animals fertilize the land
with their excrements and make the
land more fertile.

15. WET RICE AGRICULTURE
This is a type of intensive
agriculture practiced in the
Asian countries affected by the
monsoons (East and South
Eastern Asia). These winds are
wet in summer and allow the
farmers to cultivate rice, a
plant that needs lots of water
to grow. Farmers get 2-3
harvests of rice per year.
Production is high, but not
enough to allow farmers more
than subsistence.

17. COMMERCIAL AGRICULTURE
This type of agriculture is oriented to
sell the products in the market. The
origins of this agriculture are related to
the improvements introduced in
agriculture during the 18th century,
which led to an increase in production.
Farmers got enough production to feed
their families and surpluses that could
be sold in markets.
Commercial agriculture is practiced in
the most developed areas of the world:
North America, Europe, Japan, New
Zealand, Australia, Brazil, Argentina and
some areas of tropical climate.

18. Main features:
- The main aim is to produce more at the
lowest cost. Farmers invest big amounts of
money to achieve this goal:
o Use of technology to make the work
easier and faster and to save workers:
machines (tractors, harvesters,
threshing machines…), chemical
fertilizers, seeds´ selection, modern
irrigation techniques (drip irrigation,
hydroponics)…
o Crop specialization: farmers cultivate
what consumers demand.
Monoculture is common in
commercial agriculture, because
farmers can save money by cultivating
only one product in their fields.
- High production
- Small amount of workers, because the
most part of the work is mechanized.

19. SPECIALIZED AGRICULTURE
Practiced in the U.S.A. Large estates
dedicated to monoculture (wheat,
corn, cotton…), big investments in
technology, very few workers, big
harvests destined to agribusiness.

20. MEDITERRANEAN AGRICULTURE
It´s a traditional agriculture practiced all around
the Mediterranean Sea, which has modernized
to increase production. This type of agriculture
produces different products:
o Dry-land products: cultivated according
to extensive agriculture: vines, wheat
and olive trees.
o Irrigated crops: intensive crops, such as
fruit and vegetables. Greenhouse crops
are included in this group.

21. Satellite view of Almería´s
greenhouses

22. PLANTATION AGRICULTURE
COCOA PLANTATION RUBBER PLANTATION
BANANA PLANTATION
SUGARCANE PLANTATION
This type of agriculture takes
place in countries with
tropical climate. The owners
of the plantations are big
multinationals that crop
products that need heat and
humidity to grow. They hire
cheap labor (sometimes
workers are slaves) and the
production is oriented to
export. The products
cultivated in plantations are
coffee, tea, cocoa, pineapples,
rubber, oil palm, tobacco,
sugarcane …

23. Economic activity that consists
in breeding and raising animals
to use the products they give.
There are many animals that
have been domesticated and
can be bred: cattle, sheep,
horses, goats, pigs, rabbits
(cuniculture), hens and chicken,
geese (poultry)…
STOCKBREEDING

24. TRADITIONAL STOCKBREEDING
It´s often a complement of agriculture, because
the animals are used to work, to produce
fertilizers and they provide the farmers with
milk, wool and meat. This type of stockbreeding
is common in the tropics, in monsoon areas and
in some zones of the Mediterranean Sea.
There is also a subsistence stockbreeding in
very dry areas: nomadic shepherds move
periodically in search of pastures for their
livestock (camels, sheep or goats).

25. The main purpose is to sell the animal
products and get benefits. There are two
main ways of breeding animals:
extensive and intensive stockbreeding.
COMMERCIAL STOCKBREEDING

26.  Extensive stockbreeding:
animals graze in the open air
and few workers are needed.
Examples: cattle breeding in the
west of the U.S.A, sheep
breeding in the Pampa and
Patagonia in Argentina, Australia
and South Africa.

27.  Intensive stockbreeding: animals are bred
in farms or stables and they are fed by the
farmers. The purpose is to get a lot of
animals in a reduced space.
 In the stabled system animals
remain all the time in the stables all
the time and they are fed by the
farmers.
 In the semi-stabled system animals
spend part of the time in the stables
and part of the time outside.
Intensive stockbreeding is used to breed cattle
(to produce milk and meat) and poultry (eggs
and meat).

28. Commercial stockbreeding has become
very similar to an industry: animals are
vaccinated and injected with hormones in
order that they grow faster. This has caused
health problems, like the mad cow disease.
An alternative is ecological production.
The animals are bred in a natural way,
respecting their natural cycle.

29. FISHING
Economic activity that consists in extracting
resources from the aquatic environment (rivers
and seas).
The instruments used to fish are called fishing
equipment: hooks, nets, harpoons, traps…
There are different fishing techniques: netting,
trawling, trapping, angling, spearing,
almadraba (tuna fishery), electrofishing…

30. TYPES OF FISHING
- Traditional fishing: Fishers fish next to
the coast, they use traditional
techniques and production is low and
basically for self- consumption. In the
most developed countries traditional
fishing is used to fish expensive species
(hakes, seafood like lobsters, prawns…)
- Commercial or industrial fishing: The
main purpose is getting big amounts of
fish to sell in the market. Fishing
enterprises invest big amounts of
money in technology and
infrastructures to process fish.

31. Depending on the places where fish are
captured, we can classify fishing in two types:
o Inshore fishing: next to the coast.
Ships come back to port every day.
o High-sea fishing: in the ocean. Ships
are equipped with radars and sonar
to locate the shoals and freezers to
preserve the fish once it has been
processed (cleaned, salted).

32. The best fishing grounds or fisheries are located where there is a big
concentration of plankton. Plankton concentrates in some places of seas and
oceans: continental shelves, cold currents, confluence of cold and warm currents.
BEST FISHERIES

34. The international laws
recognize the right of every
coastal country to delimitate
its territorial waters: area of
200 marine miles (370
kilometers) from the coast to
the international waters. The
use of territorial waters is
exclusive of the country they
belong to.
TERRITORIAL WATERS OR EXCLUSIVE ECONOMIC ZONES
European Union exclusive economic zone

35. If the ships of a
country want to fish
in the territorial
waters of another
country, their
governments will
have to sign a fishing
agreement.

36. The main problems of fishing
are pollution and
overfishing. These problems
have reduced considerably
the quantity of fish available.
This has led to limit the fish
catch and to establish close
seasons for some species (for
example, Cantabrian
anchovy). But the problems
persist.
Fish discards

37. It consists of cultivating aquatic species in
enclosed places:
- Fish farms: freshwater fish and algae are
raised in tanks or enclosed sections of
rivers or dams.
- Mariculture: it consists in raising
saltwater fish, molluscs or algae in
marine farms, in an enclosed section of
the sea: shellfish, oysters, clams,
seaweeds, cultured pearls…
AQUACULTURE OR AQUAFARMING