10 Examples of Monocultures

The monocultures are large tracts of land dedicated to the cultivation of a single species. This is a method whose purpose is to standardize production and all related processes, especially fertilization and pest control: instead from having to keep track of the multiplicity of species in the territory, the whole process is carried out in a uniform way because there is only one. For example: corn, rice, banana.

For this reason it is said that monoculture is a large-scale modality, which aims at greater efficiency in the farm, which will translate into greater economic benefits.

Contrast with polycultures

The idea of ​​monoculture is contrasted with the most traditional of the agrarian regions, which is that of the polyculture: there the land is divided into different types of plots in which different plantations or crops are cultivated.

The generalization of a single crop over large areas of land came with the massification of the Farm products, because monoculture allows to achieve this massive production in less time.

In addition, it represents a saving in manpower since different types of machines can be incorporated, which make production more intensive: only on land of this type Direct seeding could be used, which greatly increased the productivity of the world's most fertile lands in recent years. years.

Impact of monocultures

The brusque introduction of a monoculture has almost immediate impacts on the ecosystem where it is produced: First, the fact that the crop is uniform makes it more susceptible to pathogens so that a rapid spread of diseases can occur.

Crops in general contribute to biological system that inhabit, so eliminating all variability may not be able to meet the needs of some animals that they have that site for habitat, bringing successive effects of possible losses of species. The insects that feed on the generalized crop, on the other hand, surely reproduce very easily and possibly generate some type of pest.

If the monoculture survives, it is still a agricultural system very intense, which has a rapid absorption of nutrients from the ground, so it is usual for the erosion process to be much more expedited. This is because in most crops it is harvested by removing the entire plant, modifying the natural recycling process of the soil. The productivity of the land decreases, and the addition of fertilizers becomes necessary.

Examples of monocultures

1. Corn (in different parts of America)
2. Eucalyptus (in some regions of Spain)
3. Rice (in some regions of China)
4. Soy (in the Pampas of Argentina and southern Brazil)
5. Sugar cane (in Cuba)
6. Banana (in Ecuador)
7. Coffee (in Colombia)
8. Tomato (in some regions of Chile)
9. African palm (for oil production, in Guatemala)
10. Pineapple (in Costa Rica)