A farm is an area of land, including various structures, devoted primarily to the practice of producing and managing in food production. Farms may be owned and operated by a single individual, family, community, corporation or a company. A farm can be a holding of any size from a fraction of a hectare to several thousand hectares.

History

The practice of agriculture first began around 8000 BC in the Fertile Crescent of Mesopotamia (part of present day Iraq, [Turkey], Syria and [Jordan] which was then greener).

The development of farming and farms was an important component in establishing towns. Once people have moved from hunting and/or gathering and from simple horticulture to active farming, social arrangements of roads, distribution, collection, and marketing can evolve. With the exception of plantations and colonial farms, farm sizes tend to be small in newly settled lands and expand as transportation and markets become sophisticated.

FarmingThe term farming covers a wide spectrum of agricultural production work. Subsistence farmer= who farms a small area with limited resource inputs, and produces only enough food to meet the needs of his family.Intensive agriculture and Industrial agriculture= such farming involves large fields and/or numbers of animals, large resource inputs (pesticides, fertilizers, etc.), and a high level of mechanization. These operations generally attempt to maximize financial income from grain, produce, or livestock.

TYPES OF FARMSOrchard= a farm producing tree fruits or nuts.Vineyard= produce grapes.Stable= is used for operations principally involved in the training of horses.Stud and commercial breeding farms= produce other animals and livestock.Dairy farm= primarily used for the production of milk and dairy.

Market garden or Truck farm= is a farm that grows vegetables, but little or no grain.Fish farms= which raise fish in captivity as a food source.Tree farm= which grow trees for sale for transplant, lumber, or decorative use.Plantation= is usually a large farm or estate, on which cotton, tobacco, coffee or sugar cane, are cultivated, usually by resident laborers.

TYPES OF FARMINGCollective farming and communal farming= are types of agricultural production in which the holdings of several farmers are run as a joint enterprise. This type of collective is essentially an agricultural production cooperative in which members-owners engage jointly in farming activities.

Factory farming= is a term referring to the process of raising livestock in confinement at high stocking density, where a farm operates as a factory— a practice typical in industrial farming by agribusinesses. The main product of this industry is meat, milk and eggs for human consumption.Intensive farming or intensive agriculture= is an agricultural production system characterized by the high inputs of capital, labour, or heavy usage of technologies such as pesticides and chemical fertilizers relative to land area.

Modern day forms of intensive crop based agriculture involve the use of mechanical ploughing, chemical fertilizers, plant growth regulators and/or pesticides. It is associated with the increasing use of agricultural mechanization, which have enabled a substantial increase in production, yet have also dramatically increased environmental pollution by increasing erosion and poisoning water with agricultural chemicals.Intensive animal farming practices can involve very large numbers of animals raised on limited land which require large amounts of food, water and medical inputs (required to keep the animals healthy in cramped conditions). Very large or confined indoor intensive livestock operations are often referred to as Factory farming.

Organic farming is the form of agriculture that relies on techniques such as crop rotation, green manure, compost and biological pest control to maintain soil productivity and control pests on a farm. Organic farming excludes or strictly limits the use of manufactured fertilizers, pesticides (which include herbicides, insecticides and fungicides), plant growth regulators such as hormones, livestock antibiotics, food additives, and genetically modified organisms.

Vertical farming is a concept that argues that it is economically and environmentally viable to cultivate plant or animal life within skyscrapers.Dr. Dickson Despommier, an American ecologist argues that 'vertical farming' is legitimate due to environmental reasons. He purports that the cultivation of plant and animal life within skyscrapers will produce less embedded energy and toxicity than plant and animal life produced on natural landscapes. He claims that natural landscapes are too toxic for natural, agricultural production. This is despite the ecological and evironmental costs of extracting materials to build skyscrapers for the simple purpose of agricultural production.

Ken Yeang developed at least ten years before Despommier. Yeang proposes that instead of hermeticlaly sealed mass produced agriculture that plant life should be cultivated within open air, mixed-use skyscrapers for climate control and consumption. This version of vertical farming is based upon personal or community use rather than the wholesale production and distribution plant and animal life that aspires to feed an entire city. It thus requires less of an immediate risk than Despommier's 'The Vertical Farm'.

Fell farming is the farming of fells, i.e. areas of uncultivated high ground used as common grazing. It is a term commonly used in Northern England. Elsewhere, the terms hill farming or pastoral farming are more commonly used.Ranching   Refers to the practice of grazing animals on the public lands. Some public lands may also be used for raising livestock.Dry and Irrigated Farming   Farming in areas where rainfall is deficient and there is no assured source of artificial irrigation, is referred to as dry farming.

Mixed Farming   Mixed farming is the combining of two independent agricultural enterprises on the same farm.Single Crop and Multi-crop Farming   Single-crop farming is a form of specialised farming. If a farmer specialises in crop enterprise, it is left to him to produce a single crop or a multiplicity of crops. Diversified Farming   When a farmer is engaged in a multitude of farm enterprises, it is referred to as diversified farming. If a large number of crop enterprises, with or without a number of non-crop enterprise is run by a single farmer, it is referred to as diversified farming. Raising of five or six crops makes it diversified. The motive behind diversified farming is self-sufficiency. 

Specialised Farming   In a general sense, when only few enterprises are run by the farmer, in which he has acquired special knowledge, it is known as specialised farming. Specifically, specialised farming refers to only one kind of farm business such as raising food crops or rearing sheep or raising dairy cattle. Raising two to three crops makes it specialized. The motive behind specialied farming is profit. 

In the Standard Grade Geography exam there are three types of farming, arable, livestock and mixed. Arable farms are ones where the main way of making money is by growing crops Livestock farms are where animals are the important part of the farm Mixed farms are where animals and crops are both important to the farmer