Food distribution was largely influenced by trade because farming was not communal. Farming required great organizational skills, strength, good health and good luck. Farmers who were not successful in the harvests would borrow from those who had harvested in surplus. They would repay the loan with the next harvest, failure to which they would surrender their lands to the lenders (Crystalinks.com, n.d.). This organizational system was a cornerstone of the Sumerian Civilization and source of food for the neighboring desert lands.