Today, at the beginning of the third millennium, agriculture employs only 2 per cent of the United Kingdom's workforce and contributes less than 0.1 per cent to the national income. Agriculture and land use, like so much else, are matters of government policy: regulated, subsidised and monitored. In the middle ages it was otherwise. Then, agriculture dominated the economy. At least three-quarters of England's national income came from agriculture, and agricultural products, processed and unprocessed, accounted for the vast majority of all exports. To achieve this required most of the land, the bulk of the labour force, much of the capital, and a great deal of the management talent available within the national economy. For many, farming was an occupation; for some, it was a business pursued for profit; but for none was it as yet an industry. In an almost exclusively organic and animate age, the mechanisation and industrialisation of agriculture remained a long way in the future. Without direct government intervention, it was up to individual producers how they coped with problems and responded to opportunities. There was no welfare system to cushion those overwhelmed by the challenges and misfortunes that periodically confronted all who strove to make a living from the land. Although land was prized primarily for its capacity to produce the essentials of life, its amenity value was not unappreciated. Above all, throughout the middle ages control and ownership of land conferred power, wealth and prestige.