At the beginning of March 2020, 33,611 farms in North Rhine-Westphalia managed a combined area of 1.47 million hectares. According to Information und Technik Nordrhein-Westfalen, the state's statistical office, based on the results of the 2020 agricultural census now available, this results in an area of 43.8 hectares per farm. The average farm size is thus below the national figure of 63.0 hectares. In the 1991 agricultural census, the average farm area per farm in North Rhine-Westphalia was still 25.2 hectares.
Tabular data in the graphic:
Graph: IT.NRW
The long-standing trend toward more and more large farms continued in 2020: At 3,589, 10.7 percent of farms in NRW managed 100 or more hectares of agricultural land. In 1991, this share had still been 1.3 percent with 768 farms. In 2020, the large farms accounted for 39.1 percent of the total agricultural area (1991: 7.4 percent).
Green crops had the second highest share (267,300 hectares). Horticultural crops such as strawberries and ornamental plants reached a share of 3.0 percent with 31 500 hectares.
Nearly 84,000 hectares, or 5.7 percent of all agricultural land in NRW, was used for organic farming in 2020. On average across all German states, just under ten percent of agricultural land was farmed organically.
In the agricultural censuses, important data of the agricultural enterprises in NRW and the other federal states are recorded approximately every ten years. Based on these results, existing structures can be mapped and trends and developments in agriculture can be shown. The data is available as a source of information for politics, business and science and serves as a basis for decision-making.
Since the 2010 agricultural census, all farms with an agricultural area of at least five hectares - instead of two hectares as before - have been surveyed. To ensure comparability of results, data from the pre-2010 censuses were recalculated using the 2010 Census of Agriculture coverage limits.
For more information:
Landesbetrieb Information und Technik Nordrhein-Westfalen
Mauerstraße 51
40476 Düsseldorf
Tel: 0211 9449-01
Fax: 0211 9449-8000
E-Mail: poststelle@it.nrw.de
Homepage: it.nrw