'two-cropping' originates from Modern English, specifically the words 'two' and 'cropping', where 'two' meant '2' and 'cropping' comes from 'crop' meaning 'harvest' or 'produce'.

'cropping' developed from the noun 'crop' (Middle English 'crop', Old English 'cropp'), with the productive suffix '-ing' used to form nouns of action or practice; the compound 'two-cropping' formed in Modern English to describe the practice of two crops per year.

Initially, 'crop' could mean 'a head, sprout, or yield' in older stages of English; over time it shifted to mean 'harvest' or 'agricultural produce', and 'two-cropping' came to mean specifically 'growing two crops in a year on the same land'.