Agriculture of foreign Europe. Agricultural characteristics of foreign Europe

Despite some limited land resources, foreign Europe was able to establish a fairly high-yielding agriculture. The countries of this part of the world are not only able to provide food for their own population, but for the most part they are large exporters of crop and livestock products. As for the first industry, the most developed in European countries is dairy farming. The crop production in this region is dominated by areas such as gardening and horticulture. Some countries are also the largest exporters of cereals, mainly wheat.

Agriculture of foreign Europe: share of active population

After World War II, serious changes occurred in the economies of the states of this region. The proportion of active people employed in agriculture has declined significantly. This was due to the development of new intensive production methods, increasing the welfare of the population and many other factors. However, serious differences between individual countries in this regard persisted. For example, in the UK in 2005, about 1.4% of the total active population was employed in the agricultural field, in Portugal - 19%, and in Romania - 42%. A similar situation persists today.

Main types of maintenance

Specialization, which agriculture of Europe can rightly be proud of, is subtropical agriculture. The bulk of food imports from this part of the globe are grapes, fruits, sugar and wines. The second place is occupied by dairy products - milk, meat, cheese, butter.

Thus, the main types of agriculture in foreign Europe are as follows:

• Central European with a predominance of livestock (mainly dairy) in the structure.
• South European with a predominance of crop production, mainly subtropical.

One can also single out the Eastern European type of agriculture, which is much less specialized. A similar organization is characteristic of the states of the former socialist camp.

Central European type

Countries of foreign Europe with such agricultural organizations specialize mainly in meat and dairy cattle breeding and fodder crop production. Also quite important sub-sectors in these states are vegetable growing and the cultivation of industrial crops.

Livestock

In the western regions of England, in the north of Germany and France, in the Netherlands, Denmark and Switzerland, dairy cattle breeding is especially well developed. Butter, margarine, condensed milk and cheeses make up a significant portion of food imports from these countries. In Germany, France, the Netherlands and Denmark, a lot of resources are also involved in meat and dairy cattle breeding, pig breeding and poultry farming. These sub-sectors also occupy a significant part of the agricultural structure in the UK. In areas with a poor forage base (Scotland, the Central Massif in France, the Pennines), traditional extensive sheep breeding has found good development.

Plant growing

Agriculture of foreign Europe, if we talk about the northern and western regions, as already mentioned, specializes mainly in livestock. Crop production in countries with a Central European type of organization usually plays a secondary role and is primarily aimed at helping livestock and pig breeding. Two fifths of the land in this part of foreign Europe is occupied by meadows and pastures. On cultivated soils, mainly potatoes, rye, oats and fodder crops are grown. Recently, however, crop production in countries with a Central European type of management has become an increasingly independent industry. First of all, this can be attributed to France. At the moment, this state is, for example, one of the largest exporters of wheat and sugar.

Floriculture

Agriculture of foreign Europe in the northern and western countries is focused mainly on fodder crop production. However, in this region there is another very well-developed sub-industry - floriculture. It mainly specializes in the Netherlands. In this country, they began to grow onion and tree-shrub ornamental plants a very long time ago - more than 400 years ago. The first tulips were brought to the Netherlands from Turkey. For a short period of time, thousands of varieties and varieties of this flower were bred in Holland. At the moment, the Netherlands is one of the largest suppliers of ornamental plants - tulips, roses, chrysanthemums, daffodils, etc. - in the world.

Agricultural characteristics of foreign Europe: southern type

For countries with such an organization, specialization in crop production is characteristic. Grown in the states of southern Europe , including grain. However, the most popular crops are almonds, citrus fruits, vegetables and fruits. The lion's share of agricultural production is grapes and olives.

The most striking examples of specialization in subtropical crops are the southern, adjacent to the sea areas of Spain and Italy. The latter takes, for example, the first place in the collection of grapes in the world. The annual crop of vegetables in Italy is 14-15 million tons, fruits, citrus fruits and grapes - 18-18 million tons. In the southern regions of Spain, with the help of ancient Roman irrigation systems, mainly cereals, cotton and tobacco are grown. Also, vegetable growing, viticulture and citrus gardening are very well developed here. For the collection of olives, Spain ranks first in the world.

Eastern European type

Agriculture in countries such as Poland, Slovakia, Bulgaria, etc., developed under special economic conditions. In the middle of the last century, collective farms and state farms were actively created in this region. Therefore, these countries of foreign Europe in agriculture do not have any pronounced specialization. More or less distinctly it manifested itself only in the cultivation of vegetables, tobacco, fruits and grapes. Grain farming is also developed in these regions. In particular, Hungary has made quite good progress in this branch of crop production. The grain yield in this country is 50 centners per hectare. Per capita accounts for 1,400 kg. In Romania, Bulgaria, Serbia and Croatia, mainly vegetables, fruits and grapes are grown.

Agriculture of foreign Europe (table):

In this way, in approximately the same way, the agriculture of foreign Europe is distributed across industries and sub-sectors. The table, of course, is not too detailed, but gives a general idea of ​​its structure.