Market gardening and horticulture are specialized forms of agriculture that focus on growing high-value crops. These crops are generally perishable and require intensive care, including optimal use of land, water, and labor.
Market Gardening:
Market gardening involves the cultivation of vegetables, fruits, and flowers that are grown for sale in local or nearby markets. The crops cultivated are generally of high value due to their limited growing seasons, high demand, and perishable nature. For example, crops such as tomatoes, lettuce, strawberries, and flowers like orchids are often grown in market gardening systems. These products fetch higher prices due to their short shelf life and specialized market.
Horticulture:
Horticulture, on the other hand, is the branch of agriculture that deals with the cultivation of fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, herbs, sprouts, mushrooms, algae, flowers, seaweeds, and non-food crops such as grass and bamboo. It is highly specialized in cultivating high-value crops such as grapes, apples, and various other exotic fruits, which require specific climatic conditions, intensive care, and technology.
Thus, both market gardening and horticulture focus on crops that are high in value because they are in high demand and require specific growing conditions, inputs, and care.
Read the passage carefully and answer the questions that follow:
Hunting and Food Gathering
The earliest human beings depended on their immediate environment for their sustenance. They subsisted on: (a) animals which they hunted; and (b) the edible plants which they gathered from forests in the vicinity. Primitive societies depended on wild animals. People located in very cold and extremely hot climates survived on hunting. The people in the coastal areas still catch fish though fishing has experienced modernisation due to technological development. Many species, now have become extinct or endangered due to illegal hunting (poaching). The early hunters used primitive tools made of stones, twigs or arrows so the number of animals killed was limited. Gathering and hunting are the oldest economic activity known. These are carried out at different levels with different orientations. Gathering is practised in regions with harsh climatic conditions. It often involves primitive societies, who extract both plants and animals to satisfy their needs for food, shelter and clothing. This type of activity requires a small amount of capital investment and operates at very low levels of technology. The yield per person is very low and little or no surplus is produced.
