Plantation

A plantation is a large farm on which normally only one type of crop is grown. Plantations grow cash crops, mostly for export, and less for local use. Crops grown on plantations include banana, sugarcane, coffee, tea, cotton and tobacco.

Tea plantation in Malaysia

Red Pine plantation in Canada

Most plantations are monocultures, which means that there is only one kind of crop which is grown there. This means that the farms are more vulnerable to pests.

Among the first known types of plantations were the latifundia of the Roman Empire. They produced large amounts of wine and olive oil for export.

There has been more plantation agriculture since there has been more international trade and less subsistence farming. Like every economic activity, it has changed over time. This has changed based on the amount of money people have had, who owns the land, and politics. Slavery meant that a lot of black people worked on southern American plantations.