Talk:Arable land/Archive 1

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how "natural" is agriculture?
I'm deleting the following:


 * The closest thing to a natural habitat that human beings have is the large river valleys of the world. The temperature is comfortable there, and it has plenty of fresh water, food, fish, and thirsty wild animals attracted to the water. This is why all the great ancient civilizations began on the banks of great rivers. Lots of food can be grown there, feeding the largest populations.

I think there's a reasonable argument that hunter-gatherers are more "natural" than agriculturists...

It's not clear to me what large rivers have over small ones, except in scale. Also, much of the river valleys that are now prime agriculatural land were swamps of limited agricultural potential until drained in recent times.

-- Danny Yee 08:54, 9 April 2005 (UTC)

References needed
Would it be possible to get someone to cite the refrennces to the material? This would be most usefull for people using wikipeida as launch base for further research.

-- Shaun Mc Laughlin 11:43, 3 April 2006 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 130.216.191.184 (talk)

material not highly germane moved from article to talk page until sources are found
— Preceding unsigned comment added by Anlace (talk • contribs) 20:38, 4 September 2006 (UTC)
 * David Ricardo incorporated the idea of arable land into economic theory.

Intro
I did some reworking, but remain unsatisfied. The introduction quickly veers off on a "why we're losing arable land" tangent, which really should be lower down in the article. We need more of a genuine introduction to the topic. Funnyhat 05:29, 14 July 2007 (UTC)

Agreed —Preceding unsigned comment added by 134.117.174.234 (talk) 15:25, 30 October 2007 (UTC)

Creating arable land
I don't think that hydroponics, greenhouses, PET films (?) etc. qualify as "creating" arable land. I think that these nontraditional agriculture techniques involve the creation of an artificial growth environment on nonarable land. One can grow plants indoors on an ice cap or in the center of the smoggiest city, that doesn't make it "arable land."

Likewise I don't think that "slash and burn" qualifies as creating arable land, rather, it seems to be simply a (inefficient) way to cultivate already arable land that was not previously used for agricultural purposes. NTK (talk) 08:54, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

united states urban spraw
line citing us example of sprawl is a bit biased. no context of lost land vs total arable land figure is given as the us has a huge amount of arable land especially relative to other developed countries which makes the figure less significant. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Womulee (talk • contribs) 12:56, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Definitions and numbers
I'm removing the only citation this article has, as the definition of arable land that the CIA world factbook uses isn't the same as the one for this article. Nevermind for the moment that the cited statistics don't match the CIA's, but they use the term "arable land" to mean specifically land that is currently being cultivated for annual crops. Other cropland isn't counted, nor is any land that might be suitable for crops but currently used for something else. A coherent definition needs to be decided upon, based on adequate sourcing, then statistics that conform to that definition need to be included from their respective sources. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 75.73.67.129 (talk) 07:39, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

bias dump
This article reads like a toilet stall where people have just dumped thier opinions and agendas onto random spaces leading to broken trains of thought, irrelevent comments, and the article sounding like its arguing with itself. Anyone feel like fixing this up? &mdash;Memotype:: T 19:28, 5 September 2006 (UTC)

Agreed. I am removing citation-less paragraph about arable land shrinking and replace it with information from here: http://www.fao.org/DOCREP/006/Y4683E/y4683e06.htm --Ignatiusantioch (talk) 14:27, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

Removal and change of language.
I removed and reworded a misleading sentence in the intro. Previously it said
 * Different sources have different opinions as to whether arable land is decreasing or increasing in size. Even different organizations within the U.N. have made mutually exclusive statements on this matter.

I changed this to
 * Although constrained by land mass and topology, the amount of arable land, both regionally and globally changes due to human and climactic factors such as irrigation and desertification.

I debated removing it entirely, but I didn't want to remove the two UN references, which I think are valuable even if they were misused. I'm not sure tthat "irrigation and desertification" are the best examples to use since there are many, many more that add and subtract land including terraforming (terracing and landfill) and urban sprawl. If someone wants to remove this sentence and integrate the references elsewhere or otherwise improve it, feel free, just don't restore the prior statement, because

The previous language was unacceptable. Firstly, FAO and CAPSA-ESCAP aren't exactly just departments within the UN, they are independent special-purpose UN agencies. Secondly, a close reading of the two links indicates no contradiction. The first (FAO) projects an increase in arable land, but at a slower rate, e.g. a "slowdown in the expansion of arable land." The second cites a study that shows a slow decrease in arable land only in selected Asian countries, while indicating that in other countries, especially developed countries, arable land is increasing. It makes no statement about global arable land trends. These are not "mutually exclusive" statements. NTK (talk) 16:29, 1 December 2009 (UTC)

Regional Comparison table
If the gross potential arable area of North Africa and the Near East is 500,170 km2, how come they've used 715,800 km2? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.86.156.9 (talk) 12:21, 24 June 2010 (UTC)

cleanup tags
I came accross this article while doing some research, and while the introductory article does define the term well, much of the article reads like a collage of snippets inserted here and there. It moves back and forth from a college reading level, to a fourth-grade reading level. Also, many places seem to have undue weight on issues like deforestization, and starvation (don't get me wrong, this is very relevant, but it reads like someone was scartering hints about world poverty levels, possibly eco-politically oriented. It just isn't worked into the article well, sounds like it was pasted in by someone with an agenda). Also, there are many unsourced claims, which I have added Fact tags to. &mdash;Two-Bit Sprite 13:28, 15 August 2006 (UTC)
 * P.S. I would go ahead and insert the sources myself, but I am a bit uneducated on the issue and wouldn't know where to find good primary sources. Also, in terms of the prose of the article, it's a bit too messy for me to be able to tackle without a full re-write, which I do not have time to do. &mdash;Two-Bit Sprite 13:57, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

I too was confused by the definition at the start of this article. The first sentence contains the phrase "includes all land where soil and climate is suitable for agriculture, including forests and natural grasslands, and areas falling under human settlement." According to this definition, New York City would be considered arable land! Looked at another way, most of the US would be considered arable -- most of the East, and almost everything id fact east of the Rockies. Under this misapprehension, I was dumbfounded to see in another table that the US percentage of arable land is like 18%. A profound disconnect! Geodejerry (talk) 05:16, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

I came to this page after reading an article in the Financial Times that said China has just .089 hectares of arable land per capita. It noted that this is among the lowest ratios in the world. I wondered if it is possible to create new arable land, but the page as is did not even convincingly explain in an understandable way the definition of what arable land is. Specifically, as currently written, the definitions of permanent and temporary just serve to confuse. Also, citation [2] is to an outdated link. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 169.252.4.21 (talk) 11:47, 17 June 2011 (UTC)

Arable land area, table and section
The table added in the revision on 12 February 2014 was a good idea, however it felt misplaced so I've created a new section ("Arable land area"). Also, the selection of countries in the table felt very arbitrary, so I changed it to the top 10 countries + the EU and world. I think it's relevant to have the EU in the table since the Common Agricultural Policy has a huge impact on how land is used across the EU, and the percentage of land that is arable in the EU is among the highest in the world.

I also think that we've pretty much fixed the problems with missing sources in the article, except for in the "Non-arable land" section -- so I removed the Refimprove template and added a Refimprove Section template instead in this edit as well. Gavleson (talk) 06:18, 22 February 2014 (UTC)


 * There's a relationship between "arable land" and "agricultural land" which isn't acknowledged here or in the wikipedia article on agricultural land. Footnote 9 refers to a source which charges for old data, a World Bank/FAO reference would be better IMHO. Finally, the first external source only relates to the decrease in arable land in China, which is misleading at the world level. The second external source appears to be dead.Bill Harshaw (talk) 21:22, 15 May 2014 (UTC)


 * Agriculture is not really my expertise. If you have a credible source, feel free to add or chage the text. However, I think we should play nice with the statistical freaks out there, and keep the FAO/Eurostat/Worldbank definition of "arable land" somewhat separate.


 * Not sure who wrote the leading text in the section "Arable land area", I only moved it there... Update it if you want!


 * I also haven't looked that closely at the external links, but again, I don't think anyone would mind if you changed it. -- Gavleson (talk) 19:41, 17 May 2014 (UTC)

A QUESTION
I've never seen a good definition of "arable land". This article is no exception. It distinguishes only "arable" and "unarable". The word "arable" sounds as if it should mean "land that can be farmed", not "land that can be, and is, farmed". Apparently, however, the second meaning is the one intended. So what do you call land that can be farmed but is not being farmed? I've seen the phrase "potentially arable", but that seems redundant. What, for example, is the difference being "breakable" and "potentially breakable"? But I'm not just splitting hairs. I really and truly do not know what is meant when they say "arable land". What about land from which forest must be removed, but otherwise is fertile? Is this "arable" or what? Too, presumably, any land that is being farmed can be farmed, so why say "can be, and is, farmed"? Just say "is farmed". If that is the case, why not just say "farmland"? Or are fallow lands what makes the difference?

For example, Brazil has 7% arable land. Does that mean that 7% is cultivated land, even though there may be much more that could be cultivated? Or does that mean that's all there is, and that it's all being worked.

Thomas Keyes May 18, 2006 — Preceding unsigned comment added by Thomas keyes (talk • contribs) 22:02, 18 May 2006 (UTC)


 * Yeah, the term could probably be re-defined in the article, but do you not have a dictionary? Google on define:arable:
 * Land that is fit for cultivation;
 * (1) Suitable or used for the growing of crops. (2) Land that is so suitable or so used;
 * Land suitable for farming.
 * Also, from CIA Worldfactbook"Land use -- This entry contains the percentage shares of total land area for three different types of land use: arable land - land cultivated for crops like wheat, maize, and rice that are replanted after each harvest; permanent crops - land cultivated for crops like citrus, coffee, and rubber that are not replanted after each harvest; includes land under flowering shrubs, fruit trees, nut trees, and vines, but excludes land under trees grown for wood or timber; other - any land not arable or under permanent crops; includes permanent meadows and pastures, forests and woodlands, built-on areas, roads, barren land, etc." Ewlyahoocom 22:23, 18 May 2006 (UTC)


 * That sounds reasonable, but then in the non-arable section, it sounds like non-arable is non-agricultural - that is, non-arable is mountain, desert etc. - land that isn't used for grazing or permanent crops or grown crops. Nerfer (talk) 17:45, 9 December 2014 (UTC)

MORE QUESTIONS

Of course I have dictionaries, but the definitions always leave me with the same questions. What are permanent meadows and pastures? Is there anything that prevents a "permanent" meadow or pasture from being cultivated? And what about land like Arizona? In those parts of Arizona where irrigation has been developed, as along the Colorado River, crops do just fine. Presumably they could do well elsewhere too, with more agricultural water. Are these hitherto uncultivated lands classified as arable? The second part of your second bullet says "so suitable" or "so used", but these are not one and the same thing. In Africa and probably elsewhere, there are lands suitable for cultivation which are not actually cultivated. To me, it sounds as if the choice of an adjective ending in "-able" is very inappropriate, if we are talking only about land already farmed and omitting land that might be farmed with varying degrees of ease or difficulty. I'm not trying to be argumentative. I'm trying to make sure I understand what is meant.

Thomas Keyes, May 22, 2006 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 200.85.47.22 (talk) 15:52, 22 May 2006 (UTC)


 * All good points -- I guess the point (the above is actually 4 different sources) is that its not a perfectly defined word/concept. If I planted crops last year but not this year, is that land still "arable"? And at at the accuracy and magnitude of figures cited (i.e. country/region/world sized) it doesn't matter all that much -- I don't believe anyone talks about e.g. 3 arable acres (I could be wrong, but it'd be easier to give specific characteristics of a few specific acres). BTW, an easy way to sign your posts is with 4 tidles: ~ . Ewlyahoocom 20:38, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

Spurious accuracy
In the section "Arable land (hectares per person)", the hectares per person is given to 16 significant digits!

To put this in context, if I give you a single square millimetre of land to farm, that is 0.0000001 ha – only 8 significant digits. The last digit in many of the figures represents a ten millionth of a square millimetre! If the population of the UK were to change by just one person, it would change the last seven digits of its figure! Bearing in mind that even in highly organised countries the area of arable land is probably only known to tens of square kilometres at best, and the population to tens or hundreds of thousands, this is a bit ridiculous to say the least! Actually I'm struggling to think of a more spectacular example of spurious accuracy anywhere...

The interesting part of these figures is surely only the first three or four significant digits, so I suggest we limit them to four. I've tagged the section. Richard New Forest (talk) 14:29, 26 August 2016 (UTC)

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Fixing the definition, once and for all
I had some confusion about what "arable land" is, and this article didn't do a good job of defining what it was. In fact, it got a lot of it wrong, and sources are dead or missing. After reading the comments on this talk page it appears that I'm not alone in thinking this is a problem, so I've decided to fix it and do a rewrite of the opening definition.

Here's what the previous definition said: In geography and agriculture, arable land (from Latin arare; “To plough, To farm”) is land that can be used for growing crops. It includes all land under annual crops (double-cropped areas are counted only once), temporary meadows for mowing or market and kitchen gardens and land temporarily fallow (less than five years). Abandoned land resulting from shifting cultivation is not included in this category. Data for arable land are not meant to indicate the amount of land that is potentially cultivable. Arable land is a category of agricultural land, which, according to Food and Agriculture Organization's (FAO) definition, additionally includes land under permanent or perennial crops, such as fruit plantations, as well as permanent pastures, for grazing of livestock. First of all, the opening sentence, "arable land is land that can be used to grow crops". If you think about it, that doesn't exclude anything, and there are no working sources either... Not good.

Some of it also appears to be wrong, such as: "Arable land is a category of agricultural land, which, according to Food and Agriculture Organization's (FAO) definition, additionally includes land under permanent or perennial crops, such as fruit plantations, as well as permanent pastures, for grazing of livestock." Don't know who wrote this, but it's not accurate...

I've changed it to: In geography and agriculture, arable land (from Latin arāre; “To plough, To farm”) is land ploughed or tilled regularly, generally under a system of crop rotation.

According definitions and survey recommendations by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), used by for example Eurostat and the World Bank, arable land is agricultural land occupied by crops both sown and harvested during the same agricultural year, sometimes more than once. Land is also considered arable if used as temporary meadows for mowing or pasture, market and kitchen gardens; as well as temporarily fallow land — not seeded for one or more growing seasons, yet not left idle for more than five years.

Permanent crops that occupy the land for some years and doesn't need to be replanted after each annual harvest — like coffee, rubber, flowering shrubs, fruit, nut trees and vines — is not counted as arable land, but as permanent cropland.

Permanent pastures and meadows used for grazing, land mowed for hay or silage not included in a crop rotation scheme, and abandoned land resulting from shifting cultivation is also not counted as arable, along with lands with built-on and barren areas, forests and woodlands. I've tried to make the definition simple and straightforward, but it's bound to get somewhat verbose since it's a statistical definition used by organizations like the FAO, USDA/NASS, Eurostat and the World Bank. It could be a lot worse, and most people will probably stop at the first sentence anyway, since that's enough for the layman. I've added a bunch of working citations to this definition also. Gavleson (talk) 04:44, 2 November 2013 (UTC)


 * 'Strongly disagree.' "Arable land" means land that's suitable for annual (or more frequent) cultivation.  If a government or other organization wants to compile statistics, they have to operationalize the concept somehow: you can't meaningfully gather statistics about what might have been, so they classify land according to its actual use.  Many dictionaries confirm that in ordinary English, the word refers to suitability.  The article should say basically what it has for at least the last several months: give the plain-English meaning first (one citation to the OED is enough), and then go on to how it's operationalized. --Dan Wylie-Sears 2 (talk) 19:10, 15 May 2021 (UTC)