Land Use and Agriculture in your country

Today you are going to look back at the things that we have talked about this week. 
1) (5 marks) Describe the land use in your country. What percentage is agriculture? forest? urban? 
-Try to find specific examples/maps
In Indonesia the percentage of land used for agriculture has risen. It has gone from 29 percent to 31 recently. Agricultural land refers to the share of land area that is arable and under permanent crops. Land under permanent crops is land cultivated with crops that occupy the land or long periods and need to be replanted after each harvest. The forest area in Indonesia was about 60% in 1990 however has dropped to 50% in 2010. Indonesia has one of the biggest tropical rain forests which is slowly disappearing every year. About 30-20 percent of the land is urbanized.  This land is basically turned into a city or town and is very urban!
2) (9 marks) Look at the following three types of Agriculture : Monoculture, Polyculture, Slash and burn. Describe the pros and cons of each. Think about the social economic and environmental impacts. 

Monoculture:the cultivation of a single crop in a given area.

Pros:
-market driven in country
-single crop  means cultivation is simpler
-cheaper compared to the other options

-economic advantage
-easy to do because farmers only harvest one type of crop

Cons:
-lack of biodiversity
-needs a better irrigation system
-can destroy all the crops because there is only one type

-diseases/pests spread more easily

Polyculture:the simultaneous cultivation or exploitation of several crops or kinds of animals.

Pros:
-doesnt need a complex irrigation system
-less pests and disease outbreaks because there are different types of plants
-much more stable from the other option for agriculture
-better income because if one crop fails there's another already there as a backup
-income is consistent

Cons:
-higher investment needed for equipment
-much more labours for farmers
-workers need knowledge for the caretaking if the plants (too many to learn)
-difficult to supervise

Slash:denoting a method of agriculture in which existing vegetation is cut down and burned off before new seeds are sown, typically used as a method for clearing forest land for farming.

Pros:
-removes debris
-returns nutrients to the soil
-very less equipment needed
-crops are recycled
-decomposition occurs
-cheaper

Cons:
-fire hazardous
-dangerous for animals
-bad for humans as the smoke can affect the lungs
-soil which is left naked for too long will cause erosion

3) (10 marks) What type of agriculture is common in your country? What types of crops do they grow? Describe the current state of agriculture in your country. 
The deforestation and greenhouse gas emissions of Indonesia’s palm plantations are well known. Indonesia has the world’s most palm plantations at 7 million hectares, and the government plans to nearly triple palm plantations to over 20 million in the next decade. These are the plants farmers grow on their land. The type of agriculture method they use is monoculture. They keep replanting the same crop over and over. The crop they plant is the palm plantations. Because it is in such high demand many people are clearing forest grounds to create land for planting these crops. However they do not notice the negative impact it may have. Having too many of the same crop can be a bad idea. If a disease outbreaks and attacks these plants what other option do these farmers have to obtain a profit for planting? It may be cheaper but its costing the townspeople the diversity of animals and forest grounds! The government has come up with an alternative to save the land that isn't being used for palm plantation anymore. They have decided to turn those neglected lands into a jatropha plantation. It is a plantation that feeds biofuel in East Java!