THE AGRICULTURAL REVOLUTION
The Agricultural Revolution was a major event in world history and had a profound eect on
populations throughout Europe. Indeed, many historians consider the Agricultural Revolution
to be a major cause of the Industrial Revolution, especially in terms of when and how it
began in Britain→the Industrial Revolution began in Britain in the 18th century due in part
to an increase in food production
a. Before the Agricultural Revolution
In the centuries before the start of the Agricultural Revolution, European farmers practiced a
form of farming in which they planted the same crop in the same field every year. This would
cause them to have to not plant anything in the field every few years in order to avoid
destroying the quality of the soil. However, Charles Townshend, a British statesman,
identified a way to improve farming practice→in the 1730s, he discovered that by growing
dierent types of crops in the fields year after year (crop rotation). By doing so, a farmer
could grow food in a field every year without diminishing the ability of the soil.
b. Main Characteristics
The agricultural revolution refers to the gradual transformation of the traditional agricultural
system that began in Britain in the 18th century. Aspects of this complex transformation
included enclosure (the reallocation of land ownership to make farms more compact) and an
increased investment in technical improvements, such as new machinery, better drainage,
scientific methods of breeding, and experimentation with new crops and systems of crop
rotation.
c. The Enclosure Movement
In the 1700s, the British parliament passed legislation, referred to as the Enclosure Acts,
which allowed the common areas to become privately owned. Once enclosed, use of the land
became restricted to the owner and ceased to be common land for communal use. This led to
wealthy farmers buying up large sections of land in order to create larger and more complex
farms. Ultimately, this forced smaller farmers o of their land.
Having lost their way of life, many of these farmers went to local
towns and cities in search of work→this helped create a system that created a large
workforce for the factories and mines.
d. Eects: overview
The increase in agricultural production and technological advancements during the
Agricultural Revolution contributed to unprecedented population growth and new
agricultural practices, triggering such phenomena as rural-to-urban migration.
e. Cause of the Industrial Revolution
The rise in productivity accelerated the decline of the agricultural share of the labor force,
adding to the urban workforce on which industrialization depended. In addition, as
enclosures deprived many of access to land or left farmers with plots too small and of poor
quality, increasing numbers of workers had no choice but to migrate to the city. The
Agricultural Revolution has therefore been cited as a cause of the Industrial Revolution.
f. Eects: some statistics
It is estimated that total agricultural output grew 2.7-fold between 1700 and 1870 and output
per worker at a similar rate. The Agricultural Revolution gave Britain the most productive
agriculture in Europe, with 19th-century yields as much as 80% higher than the Continental
average. As food supplies increased and stabilized and industrialized centers moved into
place, cities began to support larger populations, sparking the beginning of rural flight on a
massive scale. In England, the proportion of the population living in cities jumped from 17%
in 1801 to 72% in 1891.
