Diploma in Environmental and Land-based Studies

Environmental and Land-based production, systems and services - Level 1 Unit 2

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Some sample production systems.

One way of looking at production, systems and services is by splitting them into the following sections:

  • Plants for Food – cereal crops, fruit crops, vegetable crops, drinks, herbs, spices, flavourings, animal feed and forages

  • Plants for Clothing – cotton, flax, hemp, sisal, and synthetic fabrics such as rayon

  • Plants for Shelter, Fuel and Paper - includes Biomass and Biofuel

  • Plants for Pharmaceuticals and Medicines

Plants Production Systems Page - go to

  • Animals for Food – dairy and meat products

  • Animals for Clothing/fibre – wool/hair, hides/leather

  • Animals for Labour – draught, protection, hunting

  • Animals for Fertiliser and Land Management - Clean up 'derelict' land, use land not able to grow crops on.

Animal Production Systems Page - go to

We will use this method as it gives a suitable grouping of products to cover, you can however follow your own ideas using the crops and livestock pages available via the menu left.

Land Use in the UK.

Since both Plant and Animal systems need land which is a finite resource, then some understanding of UK land use is important to an overall understanding of UK agriculture, it's potential and limitations.

All UK land use
UK Land Uses by % total area land - 2005
Source: defra

Of the total UK Land area of 24 million hectares almost three-quarters (18 million Ha) is Agricultural Land. However not all the land classed as agricultural is suitable for growing crops, being too steep, wet, stony etc. Agricultural land is classed as Crops, Woodland, Rough Grazing or Permanent grass.

UK Agricultural Land Use
Agricultural Land Use 2008
Source defra

Before we go any further......

What does a hectare look like?

Well you probably know that a hectare is a metric unit of measure for area and it is 10,000 m². That means a 100m x 100m so think of the 100m sprint and then run that 4 times to form a square - that is a hectare.

Or in terms of football pitches which UEFA have now said must be an exact size for Champions League of 105x68m, which is an area of 7,140 m² = 0.714 ha. So a hectare is 1.4 football pitches!

If you still work in acres then 1 hectare is 2.47 acres! What is an acre - well don't go there, stick with hectares it's less complicated!

Crop areas in UK

So of the agricultural land only a third, is suitable for growing crops, around 6.2 million hectares. This land is used to grow a wide variety of crops the main ones are shown in the chart below.

UK Land Use 2008
Agricultural Crops in UK 2009
Source defra

Crop Production Systems

Details of how some of the main crops are grown can be found on the relevant arable pages accessed via the menu on the left.