Agriculture is the science, art and practice of cultivating plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that enabled people to live in cities. The history of agriculture began thousands of years ago. After gathering wild grains beginning at least 105,000 years ago, nascent farmers began to plant them around 11,500 years ago. Pigs, sheep, and cattle were domesticated over 10,000 years ago. Plants were independently cultivated in at least 11 regions of the world. Industrial agriculture based on large-scale monoculture in the twentieth century came to dominate agricultural output, though about 2 billion people still depended on subsistence agriculture.
Deforestation, clearance, clearcutting, or clearing is the removal of a forest or stand of trees from land that is then converted to non-forest use. Deforestation can involve conversion of forest land to farms, ranches, or urban use. The most concentrated deforestation occurs in tropical rainforests. About 31% of Earth's land surface is covered by forests. Between 15 million to 18 million hectares of forest, an area the size of Belgium, are destroyed every year, on average 2,400 trees are cut down each minute.
Ficus macrophylla, commonly known as the Moreton Bay fig or Australian banyan, is a large evergreen banyan tree of the family Moraceae native to eastern Australia, from the Wide Bay–Burnett region in the north to the Illawarra in New South Wales, as well as Lord Howe Island. Its common name is derived from Moreton Bay in Queensland, Australia. It is best known for its imposing buttress roots.
Ficus rubiginosa, the rusty fig or Port Jackson fig, is a species of flowering plant native to eastern Australia in the genus Ficus. Beginning as a seedling that grows on other plants (hemiepiphyte) or rocks (lithophyte), F. rubiginosa matures into a tree 30 m (100 ft) high and nearly as wide with a yellow-brown buttressed trunk. The leaves are oval and glossy green and measure from 4 to 19.3 cm long and 1.25 to 13.2 cm wide.
Ficus microcarpa, also known as Chinese banyan, Malayan banyan, Indian laurel, curtain fig, or gajumaru (ガジュマル), is a tree in the fig family Moraceae. It is native in a range from China through tropical Asia and the Caroline Islands to Australia. It is widely planted as a shade tree and frequently misidentified as F. retusa or as F. nitida.
Conservation International (CI) is an American nonprofit environmental organization headquartered in Crystal City, Arlington, Virginia. Its mission is to spotlight and secure the critical benefits that nature provides to humanity, such as food, fresh water, livelihoods and a stable climate.
Curtain Fig Tree is a heritage-listed tree at Curtain Fig Tree Road, Yungaburra, Tablelands Region, Queensland, Australia. It is one of the largest trees in Tropical North Queensland, Australia, and one of the best known attractions on the Atherton Tableland. It was added to the Queensland Heritage Register on 3 December 2009.
The International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) is an independent policy research institute whose stated mission is to "build a fairer, more sustainable world, using evidence, action and influence in partnership with others." Its director is Dr Andrew Norton.
The Environmental Justice Foundation (EJF) is a non-governmental organisation (NGO) founded in 2001 by Steve Trent and Juliette Williams that promotes the non-violent resolution of human rights abuses and related environmental issues in the Global South. It describes itself as "a UK-based non-profit organisation working internationally to protect the environment and human rights."
The environment of Indonesia consists of 17,508 islands scattered over both sides of the equator. Indonesia's size, tropical climate, and archipelagic geography, support the world's second highest level of biodiversity after Brazil.
Ficus obliqua, commonly known as the small-leaved fig, is a tree in the family Moraceae, native to eastern Australia, New Guinea, eastern Indonesia to Sulawesi and islands in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. Previously known for many years as Ficus eugenioides, it is a banyan of the genus Ficus, which contains around 750 species worldwide in warm climates, including the edible fig. Beginning life as a seedling, which grows on other plants (epiphyte) or on rocks (lithophyte), F. obliqua can grow to 60 m (200 ft) high and nearly as wide with a pale grey buttressed trunk, and glossy green leaves.
Earthwatch Institute is an international environmental charity founded as Educational Expeditions International in 1971 near Boston (USA) by Robert A. Citron and Clarence Truesdale, then superintendent of Vermont public schools. It is one of the largest global underwriters of scientific field research in archaeology, paleontology, marine life, biodiversity, ecosystems and wildlife. For over forty years, Earthwatch has delivered a unique citizen science model to raise funds and recruit individuals, students, teachers and corporate fellows to participate in critical field research to understand nature's response to accelerating global change. Earthwatch's work supports hundreds of Ph.D. researchers across dozens of countries, conducting over 100,000 hours of research annually.
The natural environment, commonly referred to simply as the environment, includes all living and non-living things occurring naturally on Earth.
The environmental impact of agriculture is the effect that different farming practices have on the ecosystems around them, and how those effects can be traced back to those practices. The environmental impact of agriculture varies widely based on practices employed by farmers and by the scale of practice. Farming communities that try to reduce environmental impacts through modifying their practices will adopt sustainable agriculture practices. Though some pastoralism is environmentally positive, modern animal agriculture practices tend to be more environmentally destructive than agricultural practices focused on fruits, vegetables and other biomass.
The environmental impact of cocoa production includes deforestation, soil contamination, and herbicide resistance. The majority of cocoa farms are now located in Côte d'Ivoire and Ghana.
Ficus variegata is a well distributed species of tropical fig tree. It occurs in many parts of Asia, islands of the Pacific and as far south east as Australia. There is a large variety of local common names including common red stem fig, green fruited fig and variegated fig. A non strangling fig which may reach 30 metres in height. The tree is evergreen when young but becomes briefly deciduous as it grows older. In Australia the fruit are eaten by cassowaries and double-eyed fig parrots.
Timothy G. Laman is an American ornithologist, wildlife photojournalist and filmmaker. He is notable for documenting all the species of bird-of-paradise in their native habitat during research expeditions with colleague Edwin Scholes of the Cornell Lab of Ornithology. His bird-of-paradise work was first published in a 2007 article about them for National Geographic. In 2016, he won the top prize in the BBC Wildlife Photographer of the Year Awards, for his image of an orangutan climbing a tree to feed on figs.
Canada's National Observer is an online daily news publication launched in 2015 as an offshoot of the Vancouver Observer. The national site focuses on investigative reporting and news on energy, climate, politics and social issues. They self-describe as a progressive news organization.
Ficus atricha, commonly known as the rock breaker fig, is a tree in the family Moraceae native to northwestern Australia. It is a banyan of the genus Ficus which contains around 750 species worldwide in warm climates, including the edible fig.
Ficus scobina is one of several fig species commonly known as sandpaper fig. Ficus scobina is a small tree that grows to a height of 3–8 metres (9.8–26.2 ft). It is native to northern Australia, from the Kimberleys across to north Queensland.
