agricultural

agricultural — adjective

1. connected with growing crops, raising animals for food, or the wider business of

1.adjectiveB1
Definition

connected with growing crops, raising animals for food, or the wider business of farming.

Example

The Netherlands earns billions of dollars from agricultural exports each year.

attributive: agricultural + noun (exports/products/goods)

Iowa State University runs a famous agricultural research program on corn and soybeans.

collocation: agricultural research / college / studies

Common collocations
  • agricultural land
  • agricultural products
  • agricultural exports
  • agricultural machinery
  • agricultural research
  • agricultural sector
  • agricultural policy
Synonyms
  • farming

    used before a noun like 'agricultural' (a farming community), but more everyday and less formal

  • agrarian

    more formal; often describes a whole society or economy based on farming, e.g. 'an agrarian society'

  • rural

    describes the countryside in general, not only the work of farming

Antonyms
  • industrial

    describes economies or land based on factories rather than farms

  • urban

    of cities; often contrasted with rural rather than agricultural, but used as a wider opposite

Grammar Patterns

agricultural + noun

Usage Note

Almost always used before a noun (agricultural land, agricultural exports). Predicative use ('the area is agricultural') is possible but uncommon; speakers usually say 'a farming area' or 'used for farming' instead.

Common Mistakes

My uncle is an agricultural.
My uncle is a farmer.
'agricultural' is an adjective; the person who farms is a 'farmer'.
She studies agricultural at university.
She studies agriculture at university.
the subject name is the noun 'agriculture'.

Word family

  • agriculture
    nounB1
  • agriculturalist
    nounC2
  • agriculturally
    adverbC1
  • agribusiness
    nounC1

Synonym discussion

Sense: adjective/1

These four words all touch on country life and growing food, but they are not interchangeable. 'Agricultural' is the standard, slightly formal word for anything tied to the business or science of farming, and is used in news and policy contexts: 'agricultural exports', 'agricultural policy'. 'Farming' is the everyday equivalent and works as both a noun and a modifier — 'a farming family' sounds warmer than 'an agricultural family'. 'Agrarian' is more academic and usually describes whole societies or reform movements, as in 'an agrarian economy' or 'agrarian reform'. 'Rural' simply means 'of the countryside' and does not require farming at all — a rural village can be full of artists, not farmers.

agricultural ↗farming ↗agrarian ↗rural ↗

Common collocations

Nouns

Phrases

  • agricultural land
  • agricultural sector
  • agricultural college
  • agricultural revolution

Etymology

LatinFrenchEnglish

Built from the Latin 'agricultura', formed from 'ager' (a field) plus 'cultura' (the act of growing or caring for something). English borrowed the noun 'agriculture' through French in the 1400s, and the adjective 'agricultural' was formed in English in the 1700s by adding the ending '-al' to mean 'of or relating to'.