Why South-East Asia has the largest concentration of peasant population at the global scale?

South-East Asia has a high concentration of peasant population primarily because intensive subsistence farming is the dominant agricultural system in the region [3]. This type of agriculture is characterized by very small land holdings due to high population density, necessitating the intensive use of land through manual family labor [1]. In monsoon climatic regions, which include South-East Asia, the high population density is supported by this labor-intensive cultivation of crops like wet paddy [3]. While shifting cultivation (primitive subsistence) is also practiced by tribal groups in the region [2], it cannot support the large, dense population concentrations found in the lowland and river valley areas . Instead, the vast majority of the rural population relies on intensive subsistence methods to secure food for their families from limited land resources [4].

Sources

1. [1] FUNDAMENTALS OF HUMAN GEOGRAPHY, CLASS XII (NCERT 2025 ed.) > Chapter 4: Primary Activities > Intensive Subsistence Agriculture > p. 27
2. [3] FUNDAMENTALS OF HUMAN GEOGRAPHY, CLASS XII (NCERT 2025 ed.) > Chapter 4: Primary Activities > Primitive Subsistence Agriculture > p. 25
3. [2] Physical Geography by PMF IAS, Manjunath Thamminidi, PMF IAS (1st ed.) > Chapter 30: Climatic Regions > Population and Economy in Monsoon Climate > p. 433
4. [4] Environment and Ecology, Majid Hussain (Access publishing 3rd ed.) > Chapter 10: Locational Factors of Economic Activities > Shifting agriculture or Primitive Subsistence agriculture > p. 13