(25 October 2016) – With more than 11 million hectares of certified area or area under conversion in 2015, organic farming made up 6.2% of the European Union’s total utilised agricultural area (UAA).
Since 2010, the area devoted to organic farming has grown by almost two million hectares.
Similarly, an upward trend can be observed for the number of registered organic producers. At the end of 2015, 271 500 organic agricultural producers were registered in the EU, an increase of 5.4% compared with 2014.
Among Member States, Spain, Italy, France and Germany registered the largest organic areas as well as the largest numbers of organic producers in 2015, accounting together for over half (52%) of both total EU organic crop area and organic producers in the EU.
The highest share of crop area dedicated to organic farming was registered in Austria, with one fifth (20%, or 552 thousand hectares) of its total agricultural area farmed organically in 2015. It was followed by Sweden (17%, or 519 thousand hectares) and Estonia (16%, or 156 thousand hectares).