Plantation
This article is about crop plantations. For plantations of people, see article Plantation (settlement or colony) for that 17th Century meaning.A
plantation is an intentional planting of a crop, on a larger scale, usually for uses other than cereal production or pasture. The term is most often used for plantings of trees and shrubs. The term tends also to be used for plantings maintained on economic bases other than that of subsistence farming.
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A plantation of Douglas-fir in Washington, USA; note the trees of uniform size and planted in straight lines, and the lack of diversity in the ground flora |
In
forestry, plantations of
trees are typically grown as an even-aged
monoculture for
timber production. Plantations are also sometimes known as "man-made forests" or "tree farms", though this latter term more typically refers to specialist tree nurseries which produce the seedling trees used to create plantations. More generally, a plantation is forest land where trees are grown for commercial use, most often in a planted forest, but may also be in a naturally regenerated forest. In the
United States, the term "Tree Farm" is a
trademark of the American Tree Farm System, a third party verification system for certifying sustainable forestry. The American Tree Farm System dates back to 1941 as a program to improve forestry practices on privately owned forestlands. The term tree farm is also sometimes used to describe the sale of live trees for landscaping.
A plantation is usually made up of fast-growing trees planted to produce
fiber. Planted forests, because of high productivity, can relieve logging pressures on natural forests. However plantations differ from natural forests in several ways:
* Plantations are usually monocultures. That is, the same species of tree is planted in rows across a given area, whereas a conventional forest would contain far more diverse tree species.
* Plantations may include introduced trees not native to the area, including (in a few cases) unconventional types such as
hybrid trees and
genetically modified trees. Since the primary interest in plantations is to produce
wood or
pulp, the types of trees found in plantations are those that are best-suited to industrial applications. For example,
pine,
spruce and
eucalyptus are widely used because of their fast growth rate, and are good for
paper and
timber production.
* Plantations are always young forests. Typically, trees grown in plantations are harvested after 10 to 60 years, rarely up to 120 years. This means that the forests produced by plantations do not contain the type of growth, soil or wildlife typical of
old-growth natural forest ecosystems. Most conspicuous is the absence of decaying dead wood, a very important part of natural forest ecosystems.
Plantations are grown by state forestry authorities (for example, the
Forestry Commission in Britain) and/or the paper and wood industries and other private landowners (such as
Weyerhaeuser and
International Paper in the
United States).
Christmas trees are often grown on plantations as well. In
Southeast Asia,
rubber,
oil palm, and more recently
teak plantations have replaced the natural forest.
Industrial plantations
These are actively managed for the commercial production of forest products. Individual blocks are usually even-aged and often consist of just one or two species. These species can be exotic or indigenous. Industrial plantations are usually large-scale.
Wood production on a tree plantation is generally higher than that of natural forests. While forests managed for wood production commonly yield between 1 and 3 cubic meters per hectare per year, plantations of tropical species commonly yield between 5 and 20 cubic meters per hectare annually; A eucalyptus plantation can have growth rates of 25 cubic meter per hectare per year, or higher. Worldwide, forest plantations now amount to less than 5 % of total forested area, but account for 20 % of current world wood production.
In the
1970s,
Brazil began to establish high-yield, intensively managed, short rotation plantations. These types of plantations are sometimes called fast-wood plantations and often managed on a short-rotation basis,as little as 5 to 15 years. They are becoming more widespread in South America, Asia and other areas. The environmental and social impacts of this type of plantation has caused them to become controversial, In
Indonesia for example large multi-national pulp companies have harvested large areas of natural forest without regard for regeneration. From 1980 to 2000, about 50% of the 1.4 million hectares of pulpwood plantations in Indonesia have been established on what was formely natural forest land.
The replacement of natural forest with tree plantations has also caused social problems. In some countries, again, notably Indonesia, conversions of natural forest are made by with little regard for rights of the local people. Plantations established purely for the production of fiber provide a much narrower range of services then the original natural forest for the local people.
India has sought to limit this damage by limiting the amount of land owned by one entity and, as a result, smaller plantations are owned by local farmers who then sell the wood to larger companies. Some large environmental organizations are critical of these high-yield plantations and are running an anti-plantation campaign, notable the
Rainforest Action Network and
Greenpeace.
Farm or home plantations
Farm or home plantations are typically established for the production of lumber and fire wood for home use and sometimes for sale. Management may be less intensive than with Industrial plantations. In time, this type of plantation can become difficult to distinguish from naturally-regenerated forest.
Environmental plantations
These may be established for watershead or soil protection. There are established for erosion control, landslide stabilization and windbreaks. Such plantations are established to foster native species and promote forest regeneration on degraded lands as a tool of
environmental restoration.
Ecological impact
Probably the single most important factor a plantation has on the local environment is the site where the plantation is established. If natural forest is cleared for a planted forest then a reduction in
biodiversity and loss of
habitat will likely result. In some cases, their establishment may involve draining
wetlands to replace mixed
hardwoods that formerly predominated, with pine species.
If a plantation is established on abandoned agriculture land, or highly degraded land, it could result in an increase in both habitat and biodiversity. A planted forest can be profitably established on lands that will not support agriculture or suffer from lack of natural regeneration.
The tree species used in a plantation is also an important factor. Where non-native varieties or species are grown, few of the native fauna are adapted to exploit these and further biodiversity loss occurs. However even non-native tree species may serve as
corridors for wildlife and act as a buffer for native forest, reducing
edge effect.
Once a plantation is established, how it is managed becomes the important environmental factor. The single most important factor of management is the rotation period. Plantations harvested on longer rotation periods (30 years or more) can provide similar benefits of a naturally regenerated forest managed for wood production, on a similar rotation. This is especially true if native species are used. In the case of exotic species, the habitat can be improved significantly if the impact is mitigated by measures such as leaving blocks of native species in the plantation or retaining corridors of natural forest. In Brazil, similar measures are required by government regulations.
Plantations and natural forest loss
According to the
FAO, about 7 % of the natural closed forest being lost in the tropics is land being converted to plantation The remaining 93 % of the loss is land being converted to agriculture and other uses. Worldwide. an estimated 15 % of plantations in tropical countries are established on closed canopy natural forest.
In the
Kyoto Protocol, there are proposals encouraging the use of plantations to reduce
carbon dioxide levels (though this idea is being challenged by some groups on the grounds that the sequestered CO
2 is eventually released after harvest).
Crops may be called plantation crops because of their association with a specific type of farming economy. Most of these involve a large landowner, raising crops with economic value rather than for substistence, with a number of employees carrying out the work. Often it referred to crops newly introduced to a region. In past times it has been associated with
slavery,
indentured labour, and other economic models of high inequity. However, arable and dairy farming are both usually (but not always) excluded from such definitions. A comparable economic structure in antiquity was the
latifundia that produced commercial quantities of
olive oil or
wine, for export.
High value food crops
Plantings of a number of trees or shrubs grown for food or beverage, including
tea,
coffee, and
cacao are generally called plantations. Some spice and high value crops grown from permanent perennial stock, such as
black pepper may also be so called. When the holding belongs to a single individual, that person may be called a
planter.
Rubber
Plantings of para
rubber, the tree
Hevea brasiliensis, are usually called plantations.
Orchards
Fruit
orchards are sometimes considered to be plantations.
Arable crops
These include
tobacco,
sugarcane,
pineapple, and
cotton, especially in historical usage.
Before the rise of cotton in the American South,
indigo and
rice were also sometimes called plantation crops.
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Early 20th century USA photo: "Negroes picking cotton on a plantation in the South" |
Slave labour was used extensively to work on early plantations (such as cotton plantations) in the
southern states of the
United States, and, in modern times, low wages paid to plantation workers are still a part of plantation profitability in some areas with minimal employee-protection legislation.
Sugarcane plantations in the
Caribbean and
Brazil, worked by slave labour, are perhaps the best example of the plantation system at its height.
In more recent times, overt slavery has been replaced by
para-slavery or slavery-in-kind, including the
sharecropping system. At its most extreme, workers are in
debt bondage: they must work to pay off a debt at such punitive interest rates that it may never be paid off. Others work unreasonably long hours and are paid subsistence wages that (in practice) may only be spent in the company shop.
Related matters
In the
U.S. South, plantations were centered on a
plantation house, the residence of the owner, where important business was conducted. The plantations engendered their own characteristic architecture; see e.g.
Berkeley Plantation.
In
Brazil, a
sugarcane plantation was termed an
engenho ("engine") and a 17th-century English usage for organized colonial production was "factory". Such colonial social and economic structures are discussed at
Plantation economy.
*
Plantation economy*
Earth Repair Network Advocates plantation forestry.
*
Pulping the South Criticism of industrial plantations.
*
Tea Plantation in Cameron Highlands Malaysia
