Quote by: Jared Diamond

Thanks to this availability of suitable wild mammals and plants, early peoples of the Fertile Crescent could quickly assemble a potent and balanced biological package for intensive food production. That package comprised three cereals, as the main carbohydrate sources; four pulses, with 20—25 percent protein, and four domestic animals, as the main protein sources, supplemented by the generous protein content of wheat; and flax as a source of fiber and oil (termed linseed oil: flax seeds are about 40 percent oil). Eventually, thousands of years after the beginnings of animal domestication and food production, the animals also began to be used for milk, wool, plowing, and transport. Thus, the crops and animals of the Fertile Crescent's first farmers came to meet humanity's basic economic needs: carbohydrate, protein, fat, clothing, traction, and transport.


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Author Bio


  • NameJared Diamond
  • DescriptionAmerican scientist and author
  • BornSeptember 10, 1937
  • CountryUnited States Of America
  • ProfessionBiologist; Physiologist; Geographer; Writer
  • WorksThe Third Chimpanzee; Why Is Sex Fun?; Guns, Germs, And Steel; Collapse: How Societies Choose To Fail Or Succeed; The World Until Yesterday
  • AwardsGuggenheim Fellowship; MacArthur Fellows Program; Pulitzer Prize For General Non-Fiction; Tyler Prize For Environmental Achievement