📘 Part 3: Agriculture and farming

This episode's vocabulary

Harm (noun) – physical or mental damage or injury. → I can't see the harm in letting children learn how to plant.

Introduction (noun) – the act of bringing something into use or practice. → It's probably a good introduction to biology.

Responsible (adjective) – having a duty to take care of something. → It's a good way to teach how to be responsible.

Proportion (noun) – a part or share of a whole. → Think about the proportion of the population doing it.

Agricultural (adjective) – related to farming or agriculture. → Most people now aren't involved in agricultural work.

Allotment (noun) – a small piece of land rented for growing plants. → Allotments of land are popular in my country.

Widespread (adjective) – found or distributed over a large area. → I'm not sure how widespread rooftop gardens are.

Surplus (noun) – an amount that is more than needed. → There would be a surplus if people bought less food.

Demand (noun) – the desire or need for something among consumers. → That could have placed a greater demand on the food supply.

Mechanised (adjective) – operated by machines. → Traditional farming uses less mechanised methods.

Variant (noun) – a version of something that is slightly different. → The modern variant focuses more on technology.

Tend (verb) – to take care of something. → You're not tending fields of crops or livestock.

Livestock (noun) – animals kept for farming purposes. → Farmers have to tend to their livestock.

Administration (noun) – the tasks involved in managing a business. → There's all the administration to deal with.

Stable (adjective) – steady and not likely to change. → How else can we have a stable food supply?

Compost (noun) – decayed organic material used to fertilize soil. → We made compost from kitchen waste to help our plants grow.

Irrigation (noun) – supplying water to land or crops. → Modern irrigation systems make farming more efficient.

Greenhouse (noun) – a glass building for growing plants. → They grow tomatoes in a greenhouse all year round.

Harvest (verb) – to gather crops. → They harvest the wheat in late summer.

Sow (verb) – to plant seeds in the ground. → Farmers usually sow seeds in early spring.

Questions and Answers

Maria: Do you think it's good to let children learn how to plant?

Rory: I can't see the harm in it. It's probably a good introduction to things like biology and similar things. Not to mention a good way to teach things like how to be responsible and look after living things. That could be useful in the future for things like pets and children, after the children learning about it grow up.

Maria: Are there many people growing their own vegetables now?

Rory: Well, in absolute numbers, probably yes, since there are more people. So that’s just very simple maths. If we think about the proportion of the population doing it, though, I'm not sure. I'm tempted to say no, since the majority of people now live in cities and aren't involved in any agricultural work these days. But I don't know much about the subject.

Maria: How do people grow plants in cities?

Rory: A good question. Apart from in pots in their houses, I have no idea. Allotments of land are popular in my country for people without gardens, but I'm not sure how common those are in other countries. I can imagine people could also have window boxes or rooftop gardens, but again, I don't know how widespread or practical those are.

Maria: What happened to the farmer's income during the pandemic?

Rory: You'd have to ask them. I'm not sure what you mean. Could you rephrase the question, please?

Maria: Like, during the pandemic, what do you think happened to the farmers?

Rory: Well, I don't know. I mean, I imagine that farmers' income would either have… Well, a couple of things could have happened. It could have stayed the same, because we still had people, and they still needed to be fed. So, I suppose the farmers would still make money selling their food. However, it could have gone down since people were earning less money, so they would be buying less food, and so there would be a surplus. Or the opposite might have happened, and the prices of food might have gone up because there were more people at home and all they were doing was eating, so that could have placed a greater demand on the food supply. So, there we are. Three possibilities, and I don't know which one is the most likely because I didn't monitor the prices of food during the pandemic.

Maria: What are the differences between traditional and modern agriculture?

Rory: Surely, that depends on where you draw the line between traditional and modern, doesn't it? Well, broadly speaking, I suppose traditional farming relies on older, less mechanised or computerised methods, just because tradition makes this connection to the past and previous methods, and those didn't involve those things, while the more modern variant focusses more on things like using machinery and technology to get things done.

Maria: What do you think of the job of a farmer?

Rory: Well, I imagine it must be quite difficult. You likely have to spend the day maintaining and repairing things when you're not tending fields of crops or livestock, and then there's all the administration and everything you probably have to deal with, like the accounting and managing deals with different companies. So, none of this is or seems particularly easy.

Maria: Is farming important?

Rory: Well, if you want to live and have food, then yes, I think it's extremely important. I don't know how else we're supposed to have a stable food supply.

Discussion

Maria: Do you think it's good to let children learn how to plant?

Rory: I can't see the harm in it. It's probably a good introduction to things like biology and similar things. Not to mention a good way to teach things like how to be responsible and look after living things. That could be useful in the future for things like pets and children, after the children learning about it grow up.

Maria: Are there many people growing their own vegetables now?

Rory: Well, in absolute numbers, probably yes, since there are more people. So that’s just very simple maths. If we think about the proportion of the population doing it, though, I'm not sure. I'm tempted to say no, since the majority of people now live in cities and aren't involved in any agricultural work these days. But I don't know much about the subject.

Maria: How do people grow plants in cities?

Rory: A good question. Apart from in pots in their houses, I have no idea. Allotments of land are popular in my country for people without gardens, but I'm not sure how common those are in other countries. I can imagine people could also have window boxes or rooftop gardens, but again, I don't know how widespread or practical those are.

Maria: What happened to the farmer's income during the pandemic?

Rory: You'd have to ask them. I'm not sure what you mean. Could you rephrase the question, please?

Maria: Like, during the pandemic, what do you think happened to the farmers?

Rory: Well, I don't know. I mean, I imagine that farmers' income would either have… Well, a couple of things could have happened. It could have stayed the same, because we still had people, and they still needed to be fed. So, I suppose the farmers would still make money selling their food. However, it could have gone down since people were earning less money, so they would be buying less food, and so there would be a surplus. Or the opposite might have happened, and the prices of food might have gone up because there were more people at home and all they were doing was eating, so that could have placed a greater demand on the food supply. So, there we are. Three possibilities, and I don't know which one is the most likely because I didn't monitor the prices of food during the pandemic.

Maria: What are the differences between traditional and modern agriculture?

Rory: Surely, that depends on where you draw the line between traditional and modern, doesn't it? Well, broadly speaking, I suppose traditional farming relies on older, less mechanised or computerised methods, just because tradition makes this connection to the past and previous methods, and those didn't involve those things, while the more modern variant focusses more on things like using machinery and technology to get things done.

Maria: What do you think of the job of a farmer?

Rory: Well, I imagine it must be quite difficult. You likely have to spend the day maintaining and repairing things when you're not tending fields of crops or livestock, and then there's all the administration and everything you probably have to deal with, like the accounting and managing deals with different companies. So, none of this is or seems particularly easy.

Maria: Is farming important?

Rory: Well, if you want to live and have food, then yes, I think it's extremely important. I don't know how else we're supposed to have a stable food supply.

Maria: So dear listener, this is quite the topic, huh? So if you have nothing to say about farming, agriculture, please go to Google, and read some articles in your own language, in your mother tongue (or in English) about farming, agriculture in your country or all over the world, because this could be the topic in Speaking and Essays as well. So at least have some ideas about traditional agriculture, modern agriculture, farming, like, what’s going on, and write out maybe 5-6 words about farming and agriculture. Children should learn how to plant or how to grow plants.

Rory: Maybe.

Maria: And a good introduction to plants is given in biology lessons. And it's a good idea to teach children to look after living things, look after to care for something. So, children should look after plants so they don't become plant murderers.

Rory: Like Maria and I.

Maria: Nobody taught me how to care, how to look after plants at school, you know.

Rory: You didn’t have basic plant biology?

Maria: No, no, like we studied some plants, but I was never taught how to grow plants. It was all like theory, you know. Today, many people are growing their own vegetables. They are also growing their own herbs, like rosemary, mint, basil. And we use the present continuous. So, people are growing their own vegetables. So, is it a trend in your country, dear listener? But is it like a trend in Scotland?

Rory: Well, is it a trend in Scotland? Who knows? I have no idea. I don't check these kinds of things. Just based on my experience and understanding of how human agriculture has evolved and developed over the years, I can give two answers. Maria is checking it for me now.

Maria: Yeah, I'm just checking. So, according to Google, yes, in 2025, many people are growing their own vegetables. So, they are interested in gardening. And people grow their own food because of the prices. They want fresh food, and they want to save up money. So, kind of people prefer homegrown vegetables, the vegetables that they grow. It is a trend, dear listener, all over the world. And you can say that the majority of people who live in cities are not involved in growing their own vegetables because they live in a flat. You know, there's no space. But overall, generally, people are growing their vegetables if they have a country cottage or even at home, some people grow their own herbs. And here, Rory doesn't know much about the subject. So, he just gives very empty answers.

Rory: Because I don't know anything about this.

Maria: Yeah, to avoid the direct answer. And it's okay, dear listener, you see, it can happen that you have nothing to say about the topic, right? And Rory uses a strategy. He kind of says like, me, me, me, statistics, numbers, I don't know how many people. So, pretty much like throwing water at the examiner.

Rory: Oh, you could do that. In absolute terms, it's like the absolute number of people. In proportional terms, that's the percentage of the population.

Maria: Yeah, yeah. Boring.

Rory: And that's a perfectly acceptable way to talk about it… It's not boring. This is how numbers are manipulated to represent things.

Maria: And then a more specific question. How do people grow plants in cities? And Rory, seriously, knows nothing. Oh, my God. But how do people grow plants? Like, seriously, I have no idea. And here you do say, dear listener, I have no idea. Seriously, I just don't like plants. I have no information about this. But then, because Rory reads the news, he talks to people, he reads books, and he has some idea about rooftops. And still, he kind of, he says something about rooftops, for example. Rooftop gardens. So, you see, kind of, you say that you have no idea. And then you use common sense. People have window boxes.

Rory: They might have window boxes, or they could have.

Maria: People who live in cities live in a flat. So, they might have window boxes for growing plants. It's, you know, like these boxes outside your window. And there people grow flowers and vegetables. And they look quite nice. It's kind of like huge boxes. Boxes or baskets, window baskets or window boxes for flowers. Or people might grow vegetables and flowers on rooftops. So, pretty much on the roof of a building, people have a garden. So, they are known as rooftop gardens or green roofs, or roof gardens. So, you kind of grow your vegetables on the roof of a building where you live. And it's kind of like, it's a green space in an urban environment, in a city environment. We have this like green oasis, like green area. Have you ever seen a rooftop garden?

Rory: I have one time, but it wasn't for growing vegetables. It was just a lawn on the roof.

Maria: So, you can say that more people develop rooftop gardens these days.

Rory: Or they have them.

Maria: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm checking. Yeah, it's a trend. Like people do it, right, in different cities. Absolutely correct.

Rory: Look at Maria checking my guesses are correct, because I totally guessed at that I have no idea about anything to do about gardening.

Maria: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Rory: I'm busy reading about ancient history and human psychology. I don't have time to read about agriculture as well. That's crazy.

Maria: And you can say that urban gardening is increasingly popular. So, urban gardening, gardening in cities. Okay, so people just grow their stuff, their plants, and vegetables in cities. People grow plants in pots on balconies or windowsills, using window boxes. And also they use rooftops to grow plants, rooftop gardens. They can also grow their plants inside their flats, just simply in usual pots. Then a strange question about farming and the pandemic. What happens to farmers during the pandemic? And again, Lori has no idea.

Rory: Why would I know that? It was the answer to the question. What did happen to their income? I imagine, probably.

Maria: Like, seriously, we have no idea. Yeah, Rory speculated.

Rory: Okay, I did speculate, but Maria is going to tell me a clear answer now.

Maria: Okay, okay, let's check. So, food prices rose. That's for sure. Okay, so after the pandemic, food prices rose. So we know that.

Rory: But did the farmers see an increase in their money as a result? I wonder. Because I don't think it's that straightforward.

Maria: Okay, okay. So, according to one article, they say that there was a decline in farmers' income. In some farmers' income. So, okay, yeah, we can say that. So the prices on food rose after the pandemic, and farmers' income declined. But why? Why did it decline? I don't understand.

Rory: I don't know. I imagine the prices inflated and then, as a result of the inflation, that compromised the economy. That would be my guess. But I don't, again, I'm not an expert in agricultural economics, so I don't know. There are some things that even the internet cannot answer the questions to.

Maria: No, there are lots of articles. You just have to read everything, and it just kind of takes so much time to understand. So dear listener, sorry, we failed this.

Rory: We tried. Moving on to the differences between traditional and modern agriculture.

Maria: No, wait, it's not good, actually, Rory. We just don't give an answer and, like, we should say something at least. It's just, like, not nice.

Rory: Well, it's unclear, and we knew that to begin with. And so it's fine to say, I'm not sure what you mean. Could you rephrase the question, please? And then afterwards attempt a series of answers. It could have been this or it could have been that. I don't know, because I'm not an expert in this field. And I think that that would be quite acceptable for this kind of question, because that's a crazy question to ask.

Maria: You do use good grammar. So prices might have gone up. So prices might have increased. Most likely, prices increased. OK, or like farmers might have lost a lot of money. So maybe farmers lost a lot of money after the pandemic. But I don't know. The examiner also doesn't know. No one knows. And then a better question. The differences between traditional and modern agriculture. Oh, wow. Yeah, this we do know. We do know all the differences.

Rory: No, we don't. How do you define the difference between modern and traditional? For most people, it's the use of computers. But the word modern has been used for hundreds of years. So we didn't have computers a hundred years ago. What's the difference there? Arguably, we did have computers a hundred years ago, but still.

Maria: Yeah, you can say that traditional farming relies on older methods. So less computerised methods. But modern agriculture relies more on machinery. So, machines and technology to get things done, to do things, modern agriculture relies on machinery. And you can say that the major, the main differences are in tools that they use. So kind of like manual labour. People did the work by hand in traditional agriculture. While in modern agriculture, people rely on advanced machinery like tractors, for example. They also use chemical fertilisers, dear listener. Rory, what are chemical fertilisers? This we do know.

Rory: Well, I suppose the most obvious example is the use of nitrogen or ammonia to enrich the soil.

Maria: Yeah, so all these are harmful or not harmful?

Rory: Well, they're only harmful if they're used in excess. And then the runoff from that goes into various water sources and causes eutrophication, which is when there's an algal bloom that, well, annihilates the ecosystem in the water, which isn't great.

Maria: And traditional agriculture used organic fertilisers. Farmers. The job of a farmer could be quite difficult, right? So a farmer maintains their fields and repairs tools. So a farmer maintains livestock, livestock like animals, and tends fields. So if we tend fields, what do we do?

Rory: Uh, we look after them. Fields are crops. Crops are plants that are grown for consumption and livestock. That is, animals that are also grown for some sort of consumption. It does not have to be for eating. It could be for their wool in the case of sheep.

Maria: And you can say that there are different opinions on the job of a farmer. Farmers are Maria: respected or they have a lot of challenges in their life.

Rory: It's not easy being a farmer. That's for sure.

Maria: Yeah, they manage the land. They grow crops. They harvest crops. They help them to grow with machinery or manually. Uh, like livestock, again, like all these cattle, pigs, sheep, different animals. So they fix the equipment, like farm machinery. They make records of different things, like how many animals they have. They deal with financial affairs. They transport their livestock between locations. So yeah, daily life for farmers is not easy. So kind of, they wake up early. They feed animals. They milk cows.

Rory: I'm exhausted just hearing about it.

Maria: Yeah, now Rory and I are gonna read articles on agriculture and farming. And we'll get back to you. Okay, dear listener? Bye!

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