The Green Revolution

After watching the documentary I wanted to learn more about the Green Revolution as I didn't understand what that was about.



Throughout history there has been many revolutions, including, the American Revolution and the Industrial Revolution. In the late 20th Century, the Green Revolution dramatically changed the field of agriculture. It was a time when the productivity of global agriculture increased drastically as a result of new advances. New chemicals fertilizers and synthetic herbicides and pesticides were created. The fertilizer made it possible to supply crops with extra nutrition which increased the yield. The herbicides and pesticides controlled weed growth or killed insects and prevent diseases, this also created a higher productivity. 

Benefits:
The creation of the chemical fertilizers, synthetic herbicides and pesticides meant the agricultural industry was able to produce much larger quantities of food, enabling the possibility of feeding the growing population.
It also meant that it was possible to grow more crops on the same amount of land with the same amount of effort as previous. This meant that production cost was less meaning the food was cheaper too.
The fact that farmers were now able to grow more crops of less land meant it was also good for the environment as it meant less natural land and forests were being converted into farm land. 

Issues:
The use of the chemicals in farming, started to decrease the quality of the soil. The new solutions also polluted the water systems around the fields. This led to the water being exposed to people and the environment. 
The larger amount of crops growing meant more water was needed, which put pressure on the natural water reserves and resulted in a shortage of water and droughts.
The amount of energy out into new large machines that were replacing the human labour also adds to the energy consumption and started the dependency on fossil fuels which will result in pollution and cause harm to the environment.

As much as the green revolution changed and helped the farming industry, it has had a negative effect on the environment in the ways of using fossil fuels. One of the biggest crisis is the oil case, and this introduced ways that used the oil instead of human labour, yes this did quicken the work and made it possible to create twice as much in ass little time, but now there needs to be new ways to do the same thing but without effecting the environment in negative ways.