Subsistence and Economy

Week 4: Subsistence and Economy

Part 1. Subsistence

1. The benefits of both subsistence patterns;

 A) For hunters: it can feed the starving family, food sharing; the egalitarian social relations; flexible division of labor by gender; mobility.

B) For Agriculture: to produce mass production of food according to the demand, the technology and knowledge of proper farming and using the appropriate tools, the industrialization of food, the marketing  or trade and exchange of product.

2. The cost or the disadvantages of both subsistence patterns. For foraging, the supply of food might not be enough of a long period of time, cultural evolution like progress; intensive farming and the agriculture development with these the foragers will be left behind and have scarcity of food. Another is the natural phenomenon like weather especially for drought season where water or irrigation is the main source of agriculture system.

3. I would say both have its own advantages or that both provide a healthier diet. Before technologies exist there is food foraging. They have the natural, healthy diet because food comes from natural or organic which means no fertilizers or the artificial feeds for animals. During this time, the main way to search food is hunting, fishing and gathering wild plants. When the technologies impact the foraging mode of subsistence, food production goes to higher level. Many used fertilizers for agriculture products and feeds for animal herding or husbandry to produce mass supply of food and also to cope with the demand. There are many health and environmental issues upon using fertilizers and pesticides in farming and studies shows that many of these result into a diseases and would affect the human health not only in agriculture so as in the animal husbandry. However, now people can still have the nutritional diet because some produces food in a natural or organic way although today it cost much to live in a healthier diet though not impossible but it is feasible to have healthy diet.

4.  Human populations made the transition into agriculture basically it offers the new technology on how to produce food. The use of appropriate tools, irrigation, exact time (proper time of when the crop is best to plant); knowledge of the pros and cons of farming; fertilizers and pesticides. Another reason could be the mass production of food supply for the demand, the urbanization and peasantry which made a strong impact toward the culture change and into the subsistence, and the convenience of producing the food rather than foraging, the agri-business which people can make money through agriculture, the industrialization which many big companies give a living for small farmers though capitalism takes place however in some point it helps small farmers to continue cultivating their crops.

Part 2. Economics and Trade

1. Direct relationship between the availability of surplus and the ability to trade is that there are products or goods which it is distributed or transferred to the consumers and transaction of product involve between the surplus and the trade. The availability of surplus created a production of product where it can supply the demand and meet the desired equilibrium. The theory of supply and demand is an organizing principle for explaining how prices coordinate the amounts produced and consumed. In microeconomics, it applies to price and output determination for a market with perfect competition, which includes the condition of no buyers or sellers large enough to have price-setting power. While the ability trade is to do transaction or commerce the product in exchange from a buyer either monetary or other products.

2. The two social benefits of trade are the import and export of product. Through import and export there is cultural exchange, a marketing network, create partnership in economic development through international trade. In Asia, the ASEAN (The Association of Southeast Asian Nations) was formed by the South East Asian countries for geo-political and economic organization. It aims to the development of economic growth, social progress and culture development. Another example of social benefits of trading is the APEC (Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation) composed of 21 countries including the United States. It aims to promote free trade and economic cooperation throughout Asia-Pacific region. APEC’s main 3 pillars are: Trade and Investment Liberalization, Business Facilitation and Economic and Technical Cooperation.

3. The two negative social results of the development of trade would be capitalism and industrialization.  There is inequality, as wealth tends to redound to a small percentage of the population; the demand for luxury goods is often limited to a small percentage of the workforce and monopoly because of the power they gain in the free market. While small farmers left behind as they are the main labourer especially in agriculture system and thus sometimes they depend on the big companies with power to gain free market.

4.  The relationship between the development of agriculture and the development of trade. Through the evolution of agriculture it provides the impact of the environment, the production of the products, the support system of trading and the economic. Thus, trading results to the development of agriculture. Agriculture is considered as the main or primary material production and it provides the physical goods for society’s survival and I believe it is the foundation of trading. Thus, it is related to each other mainly for the products exchanges. With the high demand for food, the agriculture development help to produce the supply that must also meet the demand and maintain the equilibrium as a result the development of trade exist as it is considered the distribution of the products or goods in manner of exchange either reciprocity, redistribution and market exchange.