Subsistence agriculture occurs when farmers grow crops on smallholdings to meet the needs of themselves and their families. Subsistence agriculturalists target farm output for survival and mostly for local requirements. Planting decisions occur principally with an eye toward what the family will need during the coming year, and only secondarily toward market prices. Tony Waters, a professor of sociology, defines "subsistence peasants" as "people who grow what they eat, build their own houses, and live without regularly making purchases in the marketplace". Despite the self-sufficiency in subsistence farming, most subsistence farmers also participate in trade to some degree. Although their amount of trade as measured in cash is less than that of consumers in countries with modern complex markets, they use these markets mainly to obtain goods, not to generate income for food; these goods are typically not necessary for survival and may include sugar, iron roofing-sheets, bicycles, used clothing, and so forth. Many have important trade contacts and trade items that they can produce because of their special skills or special access to resources valued in the marketplace. Subsistence farming today is most common in developing countries. Subsistence agriculture generally features small capital and finance requirements, mixed cropping, limited use of agrochemicals (such as pesticides and fertilizer), unimproved varieties of crops and animals, little or no surplus yield for sale, use of crude, traditional tools (such as hoes, machetes, and cutlasses), mainly the production of crops, small scattered plots of land, reliance on inexperienced or untrained labor (often family members), and (generally) low yields.
History Subsistence agriculture was the dominant mode of production in Europe and North America until around 1800, when market-based capitalism became widespread. During the Industrial Revolution, subsistence farmers moved to the cities and took industrial jobs. This created a large urban population for which the remaining farmers could charge higher prices for their agricultural produce. Subsistence agriculture largely disappeared in Europe by the beginning of the twentieth century. It began to decrease in North America with the movement of sharecroppers and tenant farmers out of the American South and Midwest during the 1930s and 1940s. In Central and Eastern Europe, semi-subsistence agriculture reappeared within the transition economy after 1990 but declined in significance (or disappeared) in most countries by the accession to the European Union in 2004 or 2007.
Contemporary practices Subsistence farming continues today in large parts of rural Africa, and parts of Asia and Latin America. In 2015, about 2 billion people (slightly more than 25% of the world's population) in 500 million households living in rural areas of developing nations survive as "smallholder" farmers, working less than 2 hectares (5 acres) of land. Around 98% of China's farmers work on small farms, and China accounts for around half of the total world farms. In India, 80% of the total farmers are smallholder farmers; Ethiopia and Asia have almost 90% being small; while Mexico and Brazil recorded 50% and 20% being small. Areas where subsistence farming is largely practiced today, such as India and other regions in Asia, have seen a recent decline in the practice. This is due to processes such as urbanization, the transformation of land into rural areas, and the integration of capitalist forms of farming. In India, the increase in industrialization and decrease in rural agriculture have led to rural unemployment and increased poverty for those in lower caste groups. Those who can live and work in urbanized areas can increase their income, while those who remain in rural areas take large decreases, which is why there was no large decline in poverty. This effectively widens the income gap between lower and higher castes and makes it harder for those in rural areas to move up in caste ranking. This era has marked a time of increased farmer suicides and the "vanishing village".
Adaptation to global warming Most subsistence agriculture is practiced in developing countries located in tropical climates. Effects on crop production brought about by climate change will be more intense in these regions as extreme temperatures are linked to lower crop yields. Farmers have been forced to respond to increased temperatures through things such as increased land and labor inputs which threaten long-term productivity. Coping measures in response to variable climates can include reducing daily food consumption and selling livestock to compensate for the decreased productivity. These responses often threaten the future of household farms in the following seasons as many farmers will sell draft animals used for labor and will also consume seeds saved for planting. Measuring the full extent of future climate change impacts is difficult to determine as smallholder farms are complex systems with many different interactions. Different locations have different adaptation strategies available to them such as crop and livestock substitutions. Rates of production for cereal crops, such as wheat, oats, and maize have been declining largely due to heat's effects on crop fertility. This has forced many farmers to switch to more heat-tolerant crops to maintain levels of productivity. Substitution of crops for heat-tolerant alternatives limits the overall diversity of crops grown on smallholder farms. As many farmers farm to meet daily food needs, this can negatively affect nutrition and diet among many families practicing subsistence agriculture. Water availability has a crucial role in determining the productivity of subsistence agriculture, especially in dryland regions. Rain-fed farming, common in many areas, relies only on natural precipitation. Because of this, dryland farming is particularly susceptible to the ill effects of climate change in areas where weather patterns are already very erratic.
Types of subsistence farming
Shifting agriculture
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