UPDATED ACTUAL Exam Questions And
CORRECT Answers
Von Thunen Model - CORRECT ANSWER - Developed by German geographer Johann
Heinrich von Thunen, this model explains and predicts agricultural land use patterns in a
theoretical state by varying transportation cost. Given the model's assumptions, the pattern that
emerges predicts more-intensive rural land uses closer to the marketplace, and more-extensive
rural land uses farther from the city's marketplace. These rural land use zones are divided in the
model into concentric rings.
Agribusiness - CORRECT ANSWER - System of food production involving everything
from the development of seeds to the marketing and sale of food products at the market.
Agriculture - CORRECT ANSWER - Growing plants or raising animals to produce food
for sustenance or sale at the marketplace.
Biotechnology - CORRECT ANSWER - Using living organisms to produce or change
plant or animal products.
Capital-intensive farm - CORRECT ANSWER - Farm that makes heavy use of machinery
in the farming process.
Commercial farming - CORRECT ANSWER - Growing food to be sold in groceries and
markets, not just to be eaten by the farmers themselves.
Dairying - CORRECT ANSWER - Growth of milk-based products for the marketplace.
Debt-for-nature swaps - CORRECT ANSWER - Efforts to preserve natural farmland by
forgiving international debts owed by developing countries in exchange for those countries
protecting natural land resources from human destruction.
, Desertification - CORRECT ANSWER - Loss of habitable land to the expansion of
deserts.
Double cropping - CORRECT ANSWER - Planting and harvesting a crop on a field more
than once a year.
Enclosure movement - CORRECT ANSWER - As feudalism faded away and capitalism
grew, this movement divided the common farm- one the villagers all farmed together- into
individual farming plots. Many farmers who did not get private plots moved to the growing
cities.
Ester Boserup - CORRECT ANSWER - Geographer who developed the theory that
subsistence farmers want the most leisure time they can have, so they farm in ways that will
allow them both to feed their families and to maximize free time. Boserup's theory also posited
that farmers will change their approach to farming if the population increases and more food is
needed, thus making the food supply dependent on human innovation, rather than humans
dependent on the food supply.
Extensive subsistence agriculture - CORRECT ANSWER - Using a large amount of land
to farm food for the farmer's family to eat.
Famine - CORRECT ANSWER - Mass starvation resulting from prolonged undernutrition
in a region during a certain period.
First agricultural revolution - CORRECT ANSWER - Period marked by the development
of seed agriculture and the use of animals in the farming process just 12,000 years ago; also
called the Neolithic Revolution.
Genetic modification - CORRECT ANSWER - Form of biotechnology that uses scientific,
genetic manipulation of crop and animal products to improve agricultural productivity and
products.