Mathematics Standard Level Final

Draft Exploration
Optimizing the area of a farm to minimize the fencing
required

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Table of Contents
Intorduction………………………………………………………………………………………… 4
Methodology…………………………………………………………………………………………4
Conclusion…………………………………………………………………………………………….12
References…………………………………………………………………………………………….13

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Introduction

The aim of this essay is to figure out the smallest perimeter of the farm which, when fenced will
cover the largest amount of the farm. This idea came about when we learnt about optimization in
school. Optimization is maximizing the area of a shape with the smallest perimeter. Fencing is an
important aspect of farming for many farmers as it protects their farms from wild animals ruining
their crops and land. Fencing protects farms from potential robbery and vermin. My dad owns a
farm and wishes to fence it to protect his crops and farmland from wild animals and safeguard
these crops from neighboring farmers.1 While fencing the farm would increase safety and benefit
the farm, fencing is costly. Therefore the area of the farm will be optimized so that the least
amount of fencing is used to cover the largest area possible. In optimization the perimeter is
minimized while the area is maximized. This is done by taking the derivative of the formula for
the perimeter and finding the minimum values.
Methodology

Picture 1: Picture of the farm.

1Hornbeck, Richard. "Barbed Wire: Property Rights and Agricultural Development*." Quarterly Journal of
Economics125, no. 2 (2010): 767-810. doi:10.1162/qjec.2010.125.2.767.

4
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Picture 2: Picture of the farm from Google Maps

Google maps was used to get an aerial picture of the farm which was important because as the
farm has an irregular shape the aerial shot helped map out geometric shapes from Picture 2.
Government documents about the farm gave details about how the government documented the
area of the farm, which helped me divide the farm in geometric shapes. The documents details
the areas of the shapes they had constructed. Using the area as a constraint the perimeter of these
shapes were found. Using government documents the area of the farm was determined which
helped establish a constraint to optimize the shapes. The formulas prominently used were,
𝑃𝑒𝑟𝑖𝑚𝑡𝑒𝑟 𝑜𝑓 𝑡𝑟𝑖𝑎𝑛𝑔𝑙𝑒 = 𝑎 + 𝑏 + 𝑐
1
𝐴𝑟𝑒𝑎 𝑜𝑓 𝑅𝑖𝑔ℎ𝑡 𝐴𝑛𝑔𝑙𝑒 𝑇𝑟𝑖𝑎𝑛𝑔𝑙𝑒 = 𝑎𝑏
2
𝑃𝑒𝑟𝑖𝑚𝑒𝑡𝑒𝑟 𝑜𝑓 𝑅𝑒𝑐𝑡𝑎𝑛𝑔𝑙𝑒 = 2(𝑙 + 𝑏)
𝐴𝑟𝑒𝑎 𝑜𝑓 𝑅𝑒𝑐𝑡𝑎𝑛𝑔𝑙𝑒 = 𝑙 × 𝑏
4
Using the desmos software the graph of the equation was created.

2GoogleMaps. Accessed March 25, 2019. https://www.google.com/maps/place/KrishiSuchak Raitha Samparka

Kendra
1/@16.822127,75.8878341,17z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m5!3m4!1s0x3bc6529872182fa1:0x6738d0b13ffadccc!8m2!3d16.
8221219!4d75.8900228.

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The Farm was spit up into the following pieces so that the perimeter was easily found:

Figure 1: The shape of the farm.

4"Desmos Graph." Desmos Graphing Calculator. Accessed March 28, 2019.

https://www.desmos.com/calculator.

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The first shape that will be optimized is:

Figure 2: Right angle triangle

The area for this triangle is: 533.45 square meters.

Therefore the constraint is:

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𝐴𝑟𝑒𝑎 𝑜𝑓 𝑅𝑖𝑔ℎ𝑡 𝐴𝑛𝑔𝑙𝑒 𝑇𝑟𝑖𝑎𝑛𝑔𝑙𝑒 = 2 𝑎𝑏
1
𝑎𝑏 = 533.45
2
1066.9
=𝑎
𝑏
𝑃𝑒𝑟𝑖𝑚𝑡𝑒𝑟 𝑜𝑓 𝑡𝑟𝑖𝑎𝑛𝑔𝑙𝑒 = 𝑎 + 𝑏 + 𝑐
For now “c” can be ignored as it will be found through Pythagoras theorem from a and b.

𝑑 1066.9
( + 𝑏) = 0
𝑑𝑥 𝑏
1066.9
= − +1=0
𝑥2
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 Graph 1: Curve of the equation of the perimeter of the triangle
At the critical point 32.66 any value below gives a negative value and any value above gives a
positive value therefore it is a minimum point. Plugging it into the perimeter the value of “a” can
be found.

1066.9
= 32.66
32.66
Using Pythagoras theorem the hypotenuse can be found.
√32.662 + 32.662 = 46.188𝑚

Therefore the length that will be fenced is the hypotenuse which is 46.188m

The next shape is from the top part it is:

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 b

Figure 3: Rectangle

The area of this rectangle is 8598.73m

The perimeter of this rectangle would be: 𝑃𝑒𝑟𝑖𝑚𝑒𝑡𝑒𝑟 𝑜𝑓 𝑅𝑒𝑐𝑡𝑎𝑛𝑔𝑙𝑒 = 2(𝑙 + 𝑏)

Using the area the constraint is:

𝑙 × 𝑏 = 8598.73
8598.73
𝑙=
𝑏
Plugging this into the perimeter:

8598.73
2( + 𝑏 = 0)
𝑏

𝑑 8598.73
[2 ( + 𝑏 = 0)]
𝑑𝑥 𝑏
−17197.46
= +1
𝑥2

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 Graph 2: Curve of the equation of the perimeter of the rectangle
The minimum point in from the derivate is 92.73.

Therefore the value of “b” is 92.73. As the equation above is a linear curve with

Plugging it into the constraint the value of “l” can be found out

8598.73
=𝑙
92.73
𝑙 = 92.728𝑚
This is substituted in the equation for the perimeter:

𝑃𝑒𝑟𝑖𝑚𝑒𝑡𝑒𝑟 = 2(𝑙 + 𝑏)
= 2(92.728 + 92.73)
= 370.916𝑚

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The next shape that will be optimized is:

Figure 4: Right angle triangle

The known area for this triangle is 7323.7 meter squared:

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Therefore the constraint of this shape is 𝐴𝑟𝑒𝑎 𝑜𝑓 𝑅𝑖𝑔ℎ𝑡 𝐴𝑛𝑔𝑙𝑒𝑑 𝑇𝑟𝑖𝑎𝑛𝑔𝑙𝑒 = 2 𝑎𝑏
1
𝑎𝑏 = 7323.7
2
14647.4
𝑏=
𝑎
Plugging this in the perimeter the equation is found:

𝑃𝑒𝑟𝑒𝑚𝑒𝑡𝑒𝑟 𝑜𝑓 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑡𝑟𝑖𝑎𝑛𝑔𝑙𝑒 = 𝑎 + 𝑏

𝑑𝑦 14647.4
= (𝑎 + )
𝑑𝑥 𝑎

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 Graph 3: Curve of the equation of the perimeter of the triangle

The minimum value of this equation is 121.02 meters. Using Pythagoras theorem the hypotenuse
can be found out. Using the constraint the value of b will be found out

14647.45
𝑏=
121.02
𝑏 = 121.03

𝑎2 + 𝑏 2 = 𝑐 2
𝑐 = √121.022 + 121.032
𝑐 = 171.155

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The next shape that will be optimized is:

Figure 6: Right angle triangle

The area of this shape is 2982.67

2×2982.67
The constraint is =𝑎
𝑏
the minimum point of this equation is found through

𝑑𝑦 5965.34
( + 𝑏)
𝑑𝑥 𝑏
5965.34
=− +1
𝑥2
𝑥 = 77.23

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 Graph 4: Curve of the equation of the perimeter of the triangle

Using the constraint the other side can be found:

5965.34
= 77.24
77.23
Using Pythagoras theorem the hypotenuse can be found

𝑎2 + 𝑏 2 = 𝑐 2
𝑐 = √77.242 + 77.232
𝑐 = 109.2 𝑚

Now all the sides are calculated the complete farm has the minimum perimeter of looks like this:

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 Figure 7: Shape of the farm with the perimeter

Using geogebra the equation for the perimeter of the shape was found. Using this formula, the
area of the farm will be found and compared with the documented area. The first part of the
formula is shown in the picture below:

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 Picture 2: Equation of the top part of the farm

This equation does not cover the entire top of the farm therefore this equation will be added too:

Picture 3: Equation of the top part of the farm

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The two equations for the bottom part of the farm are:

Picture 4: Equation of the bottom part of the farm

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 Picture 5: Equation of the bottom part of the farm

4.6
Therefore the equation for the area of the farm is (∫−1.68 0.01𝑥 4 − 0.05𝑥 3 + 0.06𝑥 2 − 0.14𝑥 +
6.06 0.72 9
3.14 + ∫4.06 −0.07𝑥 4 + 0.93𝑥 3 − 4.24𝑥 2 + 5.82𝑥 + 4.4)-(∫−2.56 0𝑥 − 0.06𝑥 8 + 0.64𝑥 7 −
5.32
4𝑥 6 + 15.01𝑥 5 − 34.43𝑥 4 + 47.09𝑥 3 − 35.63𝑥 2 + 12.59𝑥 − 3.57 + ∫0.18 −0.04𝑥 4 −
0.23𝑥 3 − 0.42𝑥 2 − 0.24𝑥 + 0.35)

= 1014.6 m3. Through government documents the area was determined to be 1469 m3. The
difference is due to only the top and the bottom of the farm being integrated.

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Conclusion
In conclusion, the perimeter of the entire farm is 465.376 meters. This is a summation of all the
sides of the shape. The optimization of the shapes allowed for the minimum perimeter for the
maximum area. This way the cost of the fencing was reduced to the mathematical lowest. The
cost for 100m of barbed wire fencing in the state of the farm is Rs 11,400. Therefore the cost of
the fencing is Rs 53, 05,286.4. This perimeter however cuts off considerable amount of forest
land that is legally part of the farm. This area was ignored because it acts as natural fencing for
the farm and does not require barbed wire. The lengths of all the shapes were the square root
value of the constraint as the derivations contained an 𝑥 2 in the denominator which caused the
minimum value to be the square root of the value of the constraint. The assumptions made were
that the farm could be cut up into regular shapes. Using irregular shapes more of the area of the
farm could be optimized.

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 References:

Google Maps. Accessed March 25, 2019. https://www.google.com/maps/place/KrishiSuchak Raitha

Samparka Kendra
1/@16.822127,75.8878341,17z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m5!3m4!1s0x3bc6529872182fa1:0x6738d0b1
3ffadccc!8m2!3d16.8221219!4d75.8900228.

Hornbeck, Richard. "Barbed Wire: Property Rights and Agricultural Development*." Quarterly
Journal of Economics125, no. 2 (2010): 767-810. doi:10.1162/qjec.2010.125.2.767.

"Desmos Graph." Desmos Graphing Calculator. Accessed March 28, 2019.

https://www.desmos.com/calculator.

20