A significant event in the development of agriculture occurred in 1492 with the introduction of corn, native to the Americas, to the rest of the world, and European growers adapted the plant to their unique growing conditions. Most people do not realize that among early agriculture developments, really at the genesis of agricultural technology, the ancient Egyptians made wine and made rising dough for bread, using fermentation. This article concentrates on how scientific discoveries and technological developments have allowed us to improve crop development in agriculture.

There are negative aspects to having so few members of society involved in agriculture, but this serves to illustrate how technological developments have reduced the need for basic farm labor. For example in 1870, the total population of the USA was 38,558,371 and 53% of this population was involved in farming in 2000, the total population was 275,000,000 and only 1.8% of the population was involved in farming. Agriculture has also undergone tremendous changes, many of which have made food and fiber production more efficient and safer (Figure 1). Everyone is familiar with how transportation has changed over time to be more efficient and safer (Figure 1). In many ways, technology reduces the amount of time we dedicate to basic activities like food production, and makes our lives easier and more enjoyable. Over the centuries, agricultural technology developed a broad spectrum of options for food, feed, and fiber production. Desirable traits included crop varieties (also known as cultivars, from ' cultivated varieties') with shortened growing seasons, increased resistance to diseases and pests, larger seeds and fruits, nutritional content, shelf life, and better adaptation to diverse ecological conditions under which crops were grown.

Over thousands of years farmers selected for desirable traits in crops, and thus improved the plants for agricultural purposes. During the process of domestication, people began to select better plant materials for propagation and animals for breeding, initially unwittingly, but ultimately with the intention of developing improved food crops and livestock. Have you ever wondered where our agricultural crops come from? And what were they like thousands of years ago, or hundreds of years ago? Our food crops today are in fact very different from the original wild plants from which they were derived.Ībout 10,000 years BC, people harvested their food from the natural biological diversity that surrounded them, and eventually domesticated crops and animals.

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