After the Spanish conquest, the reformation was not only political (encomenderos) and religious, through the many missionaries, but also on an agricultural level. The transition to a mixed agriculture with Old World crops was remarkably fast, mainly to do with the fertility of the lands of the Altiplano Cundiboyacense permitting European crops to grow there, while in the more tropical areas the soil was not so much suited for the foreign crops. In 1555, the Muisca of Toca were growing European crops as wheat and barley and sugarcane was grown in other areas.Francis, 1993, p. 60.
