Question

Describe the features of extensive agriculture in India.

Answer 1

Hint: Agriculture is the economic activity focussed on growing crops and rearing animals. Based on size of land, capital and labour, agriculture is further divided into extensive and intensive agriculture.

Complete answer: Extensive agriculture is a farming technique in which low amounts of labour and capital is used to cultivate land. The following are the features of extensive agriculture -
1)Large patches of land are used to grow crops. Yield is high due to the huge area of cultivable land but the per capita yield is low.
2)Extensive agriculture is practiced in areas of low density of population. This is the reason because of which this kind of agriculture is mostly managed through machines. It is not labour intensive agriculture.
3) Extensive agriculture usually focuses on a single crop. Wheat is a crop that is grown through this technique of farming.
Extensive farming is done in mid latitude zones of most continents. In this type of farming , the yield mostly depends on natural productivity and fertility of land. Extensive farming is largely inexpensive as traditional methods of farming are used. This type of farming is usually done in areas that are located far from the market.

Note: While learning about extensive farming, it is important to compare it with intensive farming. Intensive farming is farming done with the aim of increasing productivity of land. It is capital and labour intensive. It used fertilizer, pesticides and irrigation to increase yield of crops. Here the per capita yield of land is higher than that of extensive farming.