Arable farming is the growing and harvesting of crops, particularly where the ground is ploughed between harvests, as the term comes from the Latin word for ploughing. Arable farming is of enormous importance to the world’s population, since most of us rely on grains or vegetables for our staple foods.
Arable farming means growing crops in fields, which have usually been ploughed before planting. Arable crops are generally annual – they need to be replanted each year.
Land is cultivated (prepared by ploughing) in autumn or spring, and the crop is planted. It grows through the spring and summer, and is harvested in late summer or autumn. The land is then cultivated again for another crop or returned to pasture for one or more years.
Cereal farming requires vast cultivable expanses, a significant labour force and appropriate tools. This method of farming is nonetheless similar to that of market gardening. Ploughing, sowing, fertilising, irrigating and treating are steps that have been followed for thousands of years to ensure an adequate yield and an abundant harvest. Arable farming in industrialised countries now relies on a variety of specialist mechanical devices.
From sowing to harvesting, intensive cereal farming follows a similar chain of events to market gardening, only on a larger scale. Current cereal crops are mostly grown in open fields, whereas tubers, such as potatoes, can also be grown in greenhouses. Both practices require a lot of space and tools, as well as a sizeable workforce. A feature of cereal farming is that it varies according to specific type of soil and way of farming each cereal needs.
The first stage in cereal and tuber cultivation is ploughing. This involves turning the soil over to aerate it, removing residue from former crops and digging furrows. With intensive farming, chemical fertilizers are then applied to the newly ploughed soil, whereas extensive farming relies on the soil’s natural resources and alternates crops on a yearly basis.
Early missionaries were the first to grow wheat and oats in New Zealand. In the first half of the 19th century some North Island M?ori communities grew wheat, which they sold to settlers, exported to Sydney, or used themselves.
New Zealand Company settlements, such as Wellington, Nelson and Whanganui, were intended to be based on arable production rather than animal farming. However, at that stage there was a limited export market for crops, but a huge market for animal products – initially for wool and later for meat and dairy production. Cropping remained important in some areas, particularly the Canterbury Plains and North Otago, where summer conditions were ideal for maturing grain crops.