Resource use: agriculture, water and minerals
Practice Flashcards
Flip to reveal answersWhat is an extreme environment (Option C)?
Track your progress — Sign up free to save your progress and get smart review reminders based on spaced repetition.
All 12 Flashcards — Resource use: agriculture, water and minerals
Sign up free to track progress and get spaced-repetition review schedules.
Question
What is an extreme environment (Option C)?
Answer
A **hot arid** (desert) or **cold** (polar / high-latitude / high-altitude) region — sparsely settled and hard to use.
Question
Define aridity.
Answer
Extreme **dryness** — low, unreliable rainfall and high evaporation.
Question
Define irrigation.
Answer
Supplying water **artificially** to grow crops where rainfall is too low.
Question
What is an aquifer?
Answer
An **underground store of water** in permeable rock, reached by wells or boreholes.
Question
Define salinization.
Answer
**Salt building up** in irrigated soil as water evaporates, harming crops and degrading land.
Question
Why is desert farming hard?
Answer
Low rainfall forces costly **irrigation**; high evaporation causes **salinization**; soil is lost to **desertification** + wind erosion; water tables fall.
Question
How does remoteness limit resource use?
Answer
It raises **transport costs and wages** and lengthens supply lines, so extraction only pays where reserves are large and prices high.
Question
Name technologies that unlock water/minerals.
Answer
**Desalination, deep boreholes/solar wells, water transfer schemes, dams, pipelines and ice roads.**
Question
Real example — hot arid agriculture?
Answer
The **Murray-Darling Basin** (inland Australia): irrigated cotton/fruit/cereals, but over-extraction and salinization degrade the land.
Question
Real example — cold mineral extraction?
Answer
**Arctic oil and gas** (Russian Arctic, Alaska's North Slope + the Trans-Alaska Pipeline) — huge reserves, but remote, costly and risky.
Question
Why does the scope to use a resource vary?
Answer
Access to **water, technology, capital, markets and infrastructure** differs between places, so opportunity is greater in richer, wetter, better-connected locations.
Question
What does a top [10] Examine answer need?
Answer
A **named case study** with data, **both** opportunities and challenges, why scope varies between places, and a **justified conclusion**.
Read the notes
Full study notes for Resource use: agriculture, water and minerals
Topic 9.3 hub
Managing extreme environments
More from Topic 9.3
All flashcards in this topic
Geography exam skills
Paper structures & tips
Track your progress with spaced repetition
Sign up free — Aimnova tells you exactly which cards to review and when, so you remember everything before your IB exam.
Start Free