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Is there any historical reason why farming is a big industry in a state associated with deserts? Did manufacturing never take root there until after WW2 when ai

Is there any historical reason why farming is a big industry in a state associated with deserts? Did manufacturing never take root there until after WW2 when air conditioning became more affordable?

kragen 2y ago
Farming isn't an industry. It's just how you have a civilization when population density is higher than a hunter-gatherer lifestyle can support. People have been farming in Arizona for several thousand years.
- hosh 2y ago
  I don’t know why this was down voted. This is historically true. The modern canal that runs through Phoenix is built on top of ruins of a much older canal built by indigenous people for farming.
- stackghost 2y ago
  >Farming isn't an industry. It both is and isn't. Have you seen PETA footage from inside factory farms? It's hellish in that special way only the industrial revolution could produce.
  - kragen 2y ago
    We're talking about irrigated fields here, not factory farms, which are certainly nightmarish but don't use a major percentage of Arizona's water.
    - prova_modena 2y ago
      As of 2019, 72% of Arizona's water supply was used for agriculture. https://www.arizonawaterfacts.com/water-your-facts https://www.arizonawaterfacts.com/water-your-facts
      - kragen 2y ago
        Yes, that's the basis of what we're talking about here.
- chrisco255 2y ago
  Agriculture is an industry. Of course it is. It employs people, it makes use of technology, it is a distinct sector of the economy.
  - hosh 2y ago
    Industry refers to a particular way of doing things that involves portable use of power. Instead of relying on natural cycles (wind-, water-driven machinery), it involves the use of engines (steam, gasoline, electrical) to drive tractors, pumps, produce industrial-scale fertilizers, etc. These engines can be constructed where there are lack of natural resources, or made portable, thus decoupling them from locations of natural resources. That decoupling is what allows industrialized systems, including industrial agriculture, to scale. Agriculture is largely practiced with industrial methods now, but it's been around a lot longer before proto-industrial methods (water and wind mills). For example, Egypt, as a civilization, benefited from the natural flooding and silt of the Nile. It's been the bread basket for empires for several thousand years. They were not using industrial methods two or three thousand years ago. There are also other forms of agriculture that is not easily recognized by the narrow lens we have today -- such as perennial food forests, hidden in the ruins of Amazonian jungles, or the Pacific Northwest, or the forest that used to cover the lands between the Appalachia and the Mississippi river. Those were not organized with the concept of employment, and it is distinctively low-tech.
    - kragen 2y ago
      Thank you so much for writing the comment I didn't have the patience to write.
    - chrisco255 2y ago
      Yes I would generally agree that once agricultural moves from merely being an exercise in survival to being a marketable activity, it becomes an industry. In that sense, agriculture has been an industry in western civilization for quite a few centuries.
      - hosh 2y ago
epmatsw 2y ago
It's sunny for a lot of the year. Ex. you can get an extra harvest of alfalfa per year compared to other climates. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owieQnPYfT8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owieQnPYfT8
hibikir 2y ago
I am sure that some people will question some of the historiography there, but Cadillac Desert is a book all about the history of water management of the great plains, from Kansas onwards. TLDR: America has spent a whole lot of money trying to make land more productive for farming, including land where it probably doesn't make much economic sense once you account for the infrastructure costs.
- azemetre 2y ago
  Thanks for the rec, another comment mentioned water rights and that never came to my mind.
derektank 2y ago
Farming isn't really that large of an industry in Arizona today, maybe 2% of GDP tops. But my understanding is that surface water rights were allocated over a hundred years ago and naturally those rights were allocated to the people that wanted them then, i.e. agricultural landowners.
hosh 2y ago
Before Phoenix the city was founded, there was a canal built by the indigenous people who live there in the lower Sonoran. That canal became the basis for Phoenix, and eventually, the big canal that transport water long range through the state. The other is that, with sufficient water, you can grow year round. Not that I think industrial ag is good for society. Phoenix itself is a metro area whose primary economic driver is real estate speculation. Many older citrus orchards has been surrounded, and sometimes bought and redeveloped.
johnvanommen 2y ago
> Is there any historical reason why farming is a big industry in a state associated with deserts? California is a desert too.
ahoka 2y ago
I guess the Mexican border has something to do with it?

Is there any historical reason why farming is a big industry in a state associated with deserts? Did manufacturing never take root there until after WW2 when air conditioning became more affordable?

kragen 2y ago

Farming isn't an industry. It's just how you have a civilization when population density is higher than a hunter-gatherer lifestyle can support. People have been farming in Arizona for several thousand years.

hosh 2y ago
I don’t know why this was down voted. This is historically true. The modern canal that runs through Phoenix is built on top of ruins of a much older canal built by indigenous people for farming.
stackghost 2y ago
>Farming isn't an industry. It both is and isn't. Have you seen PETA footage from inside factory farms? It's hellish in that special way only the industrial revolution could produce.
- kragen 2y ago
  We're talking about irrigated fields here, not factory farms, which are certainly nightmarish but don't use a major percentage of Arizona's water.
  - prova_modena 2y ago
    As of 2019, 72% of Arizona's water supply was used for agriculture. https://www.arizonawaterfacts.com/water-your-facts https://www.arizonawaterfacts.com/water-your-facts
    - kragen 2y ago
      Yes, that's the basis of what we're talking about here.
chrisco255 2y ago
Agriculture is an industry. Of course it is. It employs people, it makes use of technology, it is a distinct sector of the economy.
- hosh 2y ago
  Industry refers to a particular way of doing things that involves portable use of power. Instead of relying on natural cycles (wind-, water-driven machinery), it involves the use of engines (steam, gasoline, electrical) to drive tractors, pumps, produce industrial-scale fertilizers, etc. These engines can be constructed where there are lack of natural resources, or made portable, thus decoupling them from locations of natural resources. That decoupling is what allows industrialized systems, including industrial agriculture, to scale. Agriculture is largely practiced with industrial methods now, but it's been around a lot longer before proto-industrial methods (water and wind mills). For example, Egypt, as a civilization, benefited from the natural flooding and silt of the Nile. It's been the bread basket for empires for several thousand years. They were not using industrial methods two or three thousand years ago. There are also other forms of agriculture that is not easily recognized by the narrow lens we have today -- such as perennial food forests, hidden in the ruins of Amazonian jungles, or the Pacific Northwest, or the forest that used to cover the lands between the Appalachia and the Mississippi river. Those were not organized with the concept of employment, and it is distinctively low-tech.
  - kragen 2y ago
    Thank you so much for writing the comment I didn't have the patience to write.
  - chrisco255 2y ago
    Yes I would generally agree that once agricultural moves from merely being an exercise in survival to being a marketable activity, it becomes an industry. In that sense, agriculture has been an industry in western civilization for quite a few centuries.
    - hosh 2y ago

epmatsw 2y ago

It's sunny for a lot of the year. Ex. you can get an extra harvest of alfalfa per year compared to other climates. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owieQnPYfT8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owieQnPYfT8

hibikir 2y ago

I am sure that some people will question some of the historiography there, but Cadillac Desert is a book all about the history of water management of the great plains, from Kansas onwards. TLDR: America has spent a whole lot of money trying to make land more productive for farming, including land where it probably doesn't make much economic sense once you account for the infrastructure costs.

azemetre 2y ago
Thanks for the rec, another comment mentioned water rights and that never came to my mind.

derektank 2y ago

Farming isn't really that large of an industry in Arizona today, maybe 2% of GDP tops. But my understanding is that surface water rights were allocated over a hundred years ago and naturally those rights were allocated to the people that wanted them then, i.e. agricultural landowners.

hosh 2y ago

Before Phoenix the city was founded, there was a canal built by the indigenous people who live there in the lower Sonoran. That canal became the basis for Phoenix, and eventually, the big canal that transport water long range through the state. The other is that, with sufficient water, you can grow year round. Not that I think industrial ag is good for society. Phoenix itself is a metro area whose primary economic driver is real estate speculation. Many older citrus orchards has been surrounded, and sometimes bought and redeveloped.

johnvanommen 2y ago

> Is there any historical reason why farming is a big industry in a state associated with deserts? California is a desert too.

ahoka 2y ago

I guess the Mexican border has something to do with it?