I read a book about Fordlandia a while back. Absolutely fascinating look at applying manufacturing principals to agriculture/horticulture without domain knowledge.

Was hard not to think of Fordlandia when reading this... odd they don't mention it.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fordl%C3%A2ndia

Here's the book. http://www.amazon.com/Fordlandia-Henry-Fords-Forgotten-Jungl...