plantations

Noun

plantation (countable and uncountable, plural plantations)

1. A large farm; estate or area of land designated for agricultural growth. Often includes housing for the owner and workers.
   • Since the mid-1980s, when Indonesia first began to clear its bountiful forests on an industrial scale in favour of lucrative palm-oil plantations, “haze” has become an almost annual occurrence in South-East Asia. The cheapest way to clear logged woodland is to burn it, producing an acrid cloud of...2013 June 29, “Unspontaneous combustion”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8842, archived from the original on 26 Mar 2019, page 29
2. An area where trees are planted, either for commercial purposes, or to adorn an estate.
   • She used to bound through the plantations, her eye first caught by one object, then another, gazing round for something to admire and to love. Now she walked slowly, her eyes fixed on the ground, as if, in all the wide fair world, there was nothing to attract nor to interest.1837, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], “A First Disappointment”, in Ethel Churchill: Or, The Two Brides. […], volume I, London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC, page 268
3. (historical) The importation of large numbers of workers and soldiers to displace the local population, such as in medieval Ireland and in the Americas; colonization.
   • Had I plantation of this Iſle my Lord.1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published...
4. (historical) A colony established thus.
   • Rhode Island and Providence Plantations (former official name of Rhode Island, United States)

See all 6 meanings of plantation