Sustainable Biomes- Challenges to Food Production: Grassland

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Grasslands are a major part of the global ecosystem, covering 37 % of the earth's terrestrial area.

Grasslands are a type of habitat that exist around the world. There are different classifications of grasslands and this video explores these with examples from Africa, Australia, North and South America.

Grass. If there is one plant that has come to dominate our world, it’s this. Occupying every biome on earth except the icesheets, grasses have colonised every patch of soil, from tropical to temperate forests, savannah to steppe, scrubland to desert. Humans have taken these grasses and shaped them over generations into crops that feed the world today. Their homelands are the seas of grass we call Meadow, Prairie, Pampas, Veldt and Steppe - the world’s Grasslands.

Revitalised native grain industry gaining momentum in the Northwest. Northwest NSW is known for producing high-quality grain. This summer, a new partnership is revitalising grain harvesting and producing flour from the traditional grains from the region.

Find out from Sir David Attenborough how changing the way we eat and a revolution in farming can save our planet’s wild grasslands.

Grassland biomes consist of large open areas of grass. Trees can be present, but they are infrequent. The animals found in grasslands range from African elephants  to various species of prairie dogs.

Grasslands are generally open and continuous, fairly flat areas of grass. They are often located between temperate forests at high latitudes and deserts at subtropical latitudes.

Biomes exist on land and in oceans and differ according to their location and geographic characteristics.

Topography (the shape of the land), climate and soils mean similar land biomes can have different species of plants and animals.

Food can be produced from different biomes when people change the environment for example by ploughing the land, building greenhouses to grow plants, draining swamps and wetlands, building terraces on slopes etc.

Grasslands can appear as desolate landscapes with kilometres of endless grass containing a few scattered trees. Instead they are home to a rich biodiversity of species and are a primary source of food for both wildlife and humans. In Mongolia traditional life is closely connected to the environment.

This book brings together information on the contrasting characteristics, condition, present use and problems of the world's main natural grasslands. Since grassland is commercialized through the grazing animal, particular attention is paid to the livestock production systems associated with each main type.