Role of agricultural & agro-pastoral practices in the formation of cultural landscapes : cultural determinants, commonalities and divergences in three continents

Humans have always interacted with their environment and helped to create and modify the landscapes in which they live. The last decade or so has seen not only a significant increase in the scope, and in some instances, speed of such developments, but also of our appreciation and understand of these changes. Throughout the world, continuously evolving agricultural practices are changing organically evolved landscapes, developed by association with and in response to their natural environment and agricultural productions. The paper introduces the characteristics of the basic relationships of four kind of cultural landscapes in Europe, India and South America: three continuing landscape formed by agricultural evolution and one resulting from religious imperative (Fowler, 2003). The results of the research help to identify problems and the values of future of agri-cultural landscapes in 21st Century.