Organic Farming Statistics

Organic agriculture world-wide

The main results of the latest survey on certified organic agriculture world-wide show (data end of 2009) that 37.2 million hectares of agricultural land are managed organically by almost 1.8 million producers.

The regions with the largest areas of organically managed agricultural land are Oceania (12.2 million hectares), Europe (9.3 million hectares) and Latin America (8.6 million hectares).

On a global level, the organic agricultural land area increased in all regions, in total by two million hectares, or six percent, compared to the data from 2008.

The countries with the most organic agricultural land are Australia (12 million hectares), Argentina (4.4 million hectares) and the United States (1,9 million hectares).

The highest shares of organically managed agricultural land are in the Falkland Islands (35.7 percent), Liechtenstein (26.9 percent) and Austria (18.5 percent).

The countries with the highest numbers of producers are India, Uganda and Mexico.

Further information

Organic-World.net: Information on 'The World of Organic Agriculture', edition 2011

Organic farming in Europe

As of the end of 2009, 9.3 million hectares in Europe were managed organically by more than 260'000 farms. 1.9 percent of the European agricultural area and 4.7 percent of the agricultural area in the European Union is organic.

Twenty-five percent of the world's organic land is in Europe. The countries with the largest organic agricultural area are Spain (1.3 million hectares), Italy (1.1 million hectares) and Germany (0.95 million hectares).

There are five countries in Europe with more than ten percent organic agricultural land: Liechtenstein (26.9 percent), Austria (18.5 percent), Sweden (12.8), Switzerland (10.8 percent), and Estonia (10.5 percent).

Compared to 2008, organic land increased by one million hectares.