Illinois surpasses every other spot of equal extent upon the face of the globe in fertility of soil and in the proportionable amount of the same which is sufficiently level for actual cultivation.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
Only around 2% of the earth's surface is cultivatable land.
The more we can grow on already cultivated land, the better.
The tillage of the soil occupies the vast majority of those who work for their own bread.
Because of technological limits, there is a certain amount of food that we can produce per acre. If we were to have intensive greenhouse agriculture, we could have much higher production.
It looks as though yields of over 10 times what we can currently grow per acre are feasible if you control the CO2 concentration, the humidity, the temperature, all the various factors that plants depend on to grow rapidly.
Barley, where it succeeds, yields a larger weight of feed per acre than any other small grain crop.
The heavier crop is ever in others' fields.
The most effective step that may be taken to increase the production of these crops is to enlarge the acreage devoted to them in the regions where they are grown habitually.
Before the discovery of agriculture mankind was everywhere so divided, the size of each group being determined by the natural fertility of its locality.
All over the land are vast and handsome pastures, with good grass for cattle, and it strikes me the soil would be very fertile were the country inhabited and improved by reasonable people.
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