USA HISTORY

Detailed explanation-1: -Tobacco was Virginia’s first cash crop. A cash crop is any crop for raised for its profits rather than its use. It was a labor intensive crop, requiring cheap labor and cheap land. Start-up costs were expensive.

Detailed explanation-2: -The dried leaves of the tobacco plant became the major cash crop in colonial Virginia after John Rolfe brought the seeds of a South American variety, Nicotiana tabacum, to Virginia in 1612. Oronoco tobacco, named for the Venezuelan valley of its origins, became the widest grown variety of tobacco grown in Virginia.

Detailed explanation-3: -Tobacco remained Virginia’s most important cash crop, but tobacco growing changed as the popularity of cigarettes increased.

Detailed explanation-4: -Tobacco formed the basis of the colony’s economy: it was used to purchase the indentured servants and enslaved laborers to cultivate it, to pay local taxes and tithes, and to buy manufactured goods from England.