Organic boom goes on

Against 11 million hectares in 1999, organic agricultural land surfaces have more than quintupled to amount up to 57.8 million hectares in 2018 while the organic market sextupled from 15.2 billion US Dollars in 1999 to almost 90 billion US Dollars at the end of 2016. These are figures out of the latest global data on organic farming that were presented by the Research Institute of Organic Agriculture (FiBL) and IFOAM – Organics International at the BioFach fair 2018 in Nuremberg.

Organic agriculture booms worldwide. Australia is the country with the largest organic agricultural area (27.2 million hectares, with 97% of that area used for grazing), followed by Argentina (3.0 million hectares) and China (2.3 million hectares). 47% of the global organic agricultural land is situated in Oceania (27.3 million hectares), followed by Europe (23%; 13.5 million hectares) and Latin America (12%; 7.1 million hectares). 

Together with the increase in organic land, the organic market grows steadily. The largest market is situated in the US (38.9 billion euros), followed by Germany (9.5 billion euros), France (6.7 billion euros) and China (5.9 billion euros). With 22% growth, France had the biggest increase in terms of market volume in 2016; the Swiss population spent the highest amount per capita for organic products and in Denmark, the organic market had the highest share with 9.7% of the total food market.

Compared with 200,000 producers in 1999, today 2.7 million organic producers work in the organic domain with India as the country with the highest number of producers (835,200).

Several push and pull factors may explain the growth of the last years. A major pull factor consist in the increase in agricultural land surfaces that are converted to organic agriculture by a rising number of farmers. Another pull factor can be identified in the higher prices organic farmers get for their products. In countries where public subsidies exist for farmers who work organically, e.g. in EU countries, these financial aids can be seen as a push factor. Other push factors can be found in political measures such as the duty for public caterers in Denmark to offer organic food. 

Source of data: FiBL & IFOAM – Organics International (2018) The World of Organic Agriculture. Statistics and Emerging Trends 2018. Frick and Bonn

For more information 

<media 4555>Press Release BIOFach 2018</media>