Food, Agriculture and Agricultural Engineering

Abstract

Most of the population of the developing world lives in the rural areas and is engaged in agriculture or agriculture-related activities. Essentially, agriculture is concerned with the collection of solar energy and its use in synthesising a few simple inorganic materials—principally water, carbon dioxide from the air and nitrogen—into organic vegetable materials by means of the plant. This is the bioconversion process on which all life depends.★ The resulting vegetable material may be used directly as food or can be fed to animals which in turn may be used as food. As the elementary biology books point out, animals are entirely dependent on plants for their food. In addition to their use as food, plants have long provided traditional building material in the form of wood, rushes, etc., energy for heating and cooking in the form of wood; also fibres, cotton, oils and rubber.

And he gave it for his opinion … that whoever could make two ears of corn, or two blades of grass, to grow upon a spot where only one grew before, would deserve better of mankind, and do more essential service to his country, than the whole race of politicians put together.

Gulliver’s Travels, Dean Swift