Twentieth Century Land Use Planning a Stalwart Family Tree

The focus of this entry is land use for agriculture. But we are too studying other uses of land, including land required for human settlement.

Agriculture is a major use of land. Half of the earth'south habitable land is used for agronomics. The extensive land utilize has a major bear upon on the earth'southward environment as it reduces wilderness and threatens biodiversity.

Reducing the consumption of resource-intensive products and increasing the productivity of land makes it possible to produce nutrient with much smaller inputs and reducing the impact on the environment.

All our charts on Land Use

Half of the world'southward habitable land is used for agriculture

For much of human history, most of the world's land was wilderness: forests, grasslands and shrubbery dominated its landscapes. Over the terminal few centuries, this has changed dramatically: wild habitats have been squeezed out by turning it into agronomical country.

If nosotros rewind chiliad years, information technology is estimated that merely 4 1000000 square kilometers – less than 4% of the world's ice-free and non-barren state area was used for farming.

In the visualization we see the breakdown of global land expanse today. 10% of the world is covered by glaciers, and a further 19% is barren land – deserts, dry salt flats, beaches, sand dunes, and exposed rocks.¹ This leaves what we call 'habitable land'. Half of all habitable land is used for agriculture.²

This leaves only 37% for forests; 11% as shrubs and grasslands; i% every bit freshwater coverage; and the remaining one% – a much smaller share than many suspect – is built-up urban surface area which includes cities, towns, villages, roads and other human infrastructure.

There is also a highly unequal distribution of land utilize betwixt livestock and crops for human consumption. If we combine pastures used for grazing with country used to abound crops for animal feed, livestock accounts for 77% of global farming land. While livestock takes upward most of the earth's agricultural state it only produces 18% of the world'south calories and 37% of total protein.^three

The expansion of agronomics has been i of humanity's largest impacts on the surroundings. It has transformed habitats and is i of the greatest pressures for biodiversity: of the 28,000 species evaluated to be threatened with extinction on the IUCN Ruby List, agriculture is listed as a threat for 24,000 of them.^four Only we too know that we can reduce these impacts – both through dietary changes, by substituting some meat with plant-based alternatives and through technology advances. Ingather yields take increased significantly in recent decades, meaning we take spared a lot of land from agricultural production: globally, to produce the aforementioned amount of crops as in 1961, nosotros need only xxx% of the farmland.

With solutions from both consumers and producers, we have an important opportunity to restore some of this farmland back to forests and natural habitats.

How the globe's land is used: full area sizes by type of use & cover

Visualising land utilize areas on a global map is perhaps the nearly relatable way to understand the scale of dissimilar land uses across the world. In the visualization hither we show the graphic displayed above – on the breakdown of global land use & cover – by scale on a global map.

Here, land use groupings are aggregated to show the total surface expanse allocated for each. Note that these are not used to represent the distribution of each: this effigy does not hateful the Usa is wholly used for livestock, or that Europe comprises only of arid land. It is used to indicate the global areal extent of each country use but.

We run across that:

global land allocated to livestock – either in the course of grazing country or cropland used for creature feed is equivalent to the surface area of the Americas (North, Central and South America combined);
cropland (minus land used for the production of animate being feed) is equivalent to the expanse of East Asia-Pacific, extending as far due south as Thailand;
forested area is equal to Africa (minus Great socialist people's libyan arab jamahiriya), the Middle East and South Asia;
global freshwater (inland water bodies) approximates to the area of Mongolia
full build-upward land (villages, towns, cities & infrastructure) would fit into an area the size of Great socialist people's libyan arab jamahiriya;
shrub land is equivalent to an area the size of East Asia-Pacific, from Malaysia southwards;
barren country is equivalent to the size of Europe;
glaciers (permanent ice & snow) approximates to an area of Antarctica & Greenland combined.

How has global state use changed over the long-term?

The visualisation shows human land use over the long-term (since 10,000 BC), and details the alter in total land used for cropland, grazing land and built-up/urban area in hectares. This can also be viewed by select countries and all regions using the "alter state/region" option.

Agronomical state utilise over the long-run

Full agricultural land apply
Cropland use
Grazing country use

Total agricultural land use

This visualisation shows total land used for agriculture (which is a combination of cropland and grazing land) over the long-term, measured in hectares. In the post-obit sections you can discover disaggregated data for cropland and grazing state change over time.

Cropland employ

This visualisation shows total cropland (which does not include state for grazing) over the long-term, measured in hectares.

Grazing state apply

This visualisation shows full grazing land over the long-term, measured in hectares.

How much land practise countries utilize for agronomics?

Abundant agriculture (cropland)
Pastureland (permanent meadows and pasture)

We utilise roughly half of global habitable state for agriculture. But how much of total land expanse is utilised for agriculture across the globe? In the map here we encounter the share of total (both habitable and non-habitable) land area used for agriculture.

There is large variability in the share of land a given country uses for agronomics. Allocation ranges from less than ten percent, especially beyond countries in Sub-Saharan Africa and the Scandinavian region to close to lxxx percentage across most regions (including the UK, Uruguay, South Africa, Nigeria and Saudi Arabia). It's of import to note that this metric includes both land used for arable (cropland) production and pasture land for livestock grazing; this means that agriculture tin can consume a big share of land surface area, even in barren and semi-barren regions where extensive arable farming is not possible. Nosotros will explore this difference in cropland and pastureland in the following section.

If nosotros view the map in "chart" way, nosotros see how the allocation of land to agronomics has changed over time across the global regions. The share of land used for agriculture has been slowly increasing beyond most of the world's regions over the past few decades. Even so, state use beyond Europe and Central Asia- particularly within the European Spousal relationship (EU) zone- and N America has been declining.

Arable agronomics (cropland)

In that location are two main uses of agronomical land: arable farming (which is land dedicated to growing crops), and pastureland (which includes meadows and pastures used for livestock rearing). In the nautical chart hither nosotros see a global map of state used for arable agriculture (as a share of full state expanse).

For about countries, as nosotros will bear witness in the section below, land use for livestock grazing is dominant relative to arable farming. For nearly countries, land dedicated to cropland is typically beneath 20 pct, with many countries dedicating less than 10 percent. There are some notable exceptions, however; countries in South asia and Europe allocate a large share of state expanse to abundant farming. India, Bangladesh, Ukraine and Kingdom of denmark all dedicated more than one-half of total land area to cropland in 2015.

Pastureland (permanent meadows and pasture)

For virtually countries, the bulk of agricultural land is used for livestock rearing in the grade of pastureland. In the map here we see the share of permanent meadows and pasture as a percentage of full land area.

As a contrast to arable farming, land utilise for livestock in Europe and South Asia, in particular, is typically less than 20 percent. However, most continental regions accept countries where pastureland reaches close to half of total country surface area. In some countries (particularly in Central Asia, including Mongolia, Republic of kazakhstan, and Turkmenistan) this tin can reach upwardly to 70 per centum. Livestock farming tin accept place beyond a range of diverse climatic and ecology regions (for instance, ranging from cattle rearing in temperate regions to sheep farming in hilly and semi-arid terrain); meaning that this type of agriculture is potentially less geographically-constrained than arable farming.

Cropland use per person

Cropland per person over the long-term

The visualisation here shows the change in the average cropland use per person over the long-term (since x,000 BC), measured in hectares per person.

Cropland utilise per person in the near-term

Global population has more than than doubled over the last fifty years. To meet the demands of a rapidly growing population on a planet with finite land resources, reducing our per capita land footprint is essential.

In the chart here nosotros have plotted trends of the average arable land apply per person beyond the globe'south regions. Overall we see that the abundant country use per capita has declined beyond all regions since 1961. Per capita country employ is highest in Northward America– more than double the land apply of any other region. Country use in Asia– both in South and Eastern asia is lowest (5-6 times less than in North America). Rates of reduction in Southern asia have been the nearly dramatic; per capita land use in 2014 was roughly one-third of its value in 1961.

Agricultural land use per person

Agricultural state per person over the long-term

The visualisation shows the modify in the average agronomical state utilise (which is the sum of cropland and grazing area) per person over the long-term (since 10,000 BC), measured in hectares per person.

Agricultural state per person over the near-term

If we extend our land coverage in a higher place from arable state utilise to total agricultural state (which is the sum of arable, permanent crops and pastures and meadows), we still see overall declines in land per person merely with different rates and patterns of reduction. Overall, nosotros see that agricultural land per person is higher than that of arable state. At the global level, per capita agricultural land utilize is now less than half its value in 1961.

Africa in detail has seen dramatic reductions in agricultural country per person – at present less than one-third of per capita land 50 years ago. The Americas (Due north and South) and Africa have notably higher per capita agricultural land use relative to Europe and Asia.

Land use past crop

In the chart here we see the global area of land use in agronomics past major crop types, from 1961 to 2014. Overall, we encounter that the majority of our arable country is used for cereal product; this has grown from effectually 650 to 720 million hectares (an surface area roughly twice the size of Germany) over this catamenia. The total land expanse used for coarse grains has remained approximately constant over this 50 year menstruation, and is the 2nd largest user of abundant land.

The most dramatic increase in land allocation is in the production of oilcrops. Total land area used for oilcrop production has increased nigh 3-fold since 1961– an area but brusk of the size of Mexico. All other crop types take upwards less than 100 million hectares of global area.

The amount of land required to produce food has broad variations depending on the product–this is peculiarly true when differentiating crops and beast products. In the chart here we have plotted the average land required (sometimes termed the "land footprint") to produce i gram of protein beyond a range of food types.

At the lesser of the calibration, nosotros see that cereal crops typically have a small country impact per unit of measurement of protein (although such poly peptide is oftentimes lacking in some essential amino acids). At the upper finish of the spectrum we detect meat products, with the country required for beef or mutton upward to 100 times larger than cereals. However, it's of import to note the differences in land required across the meat products: poultry and pork have a land footprint 8-x times lower than that of beef. This means individuals can make notable reductions in the environmental impact of their diets simply by substituting lower-impact meat products for beef or mutton.

Arable country needed per unit of crop product

This visualization shows the index of the arable land expanse needed to produce an equivalent amass of crop production, relative to the land expanse needed in 1961 i.e. values in 1961 are equal to i.0. For example, globally in 2014, the index value was 0.3; this means just 30% of the arable state area was needed to produce the aforementioned quantity of crops relative to 1961. seventy% less country was needed.

This data can be viewed for other countries and regions by selecting ' Add country ' on the chart.

The crop production index (PIN) is the sum of ingather commodities produced (after deductions of quantities used as seed and feed). It is weighted by the commodity prices. The FAO explains the construction of the Pin in detail here.

The idea for this chart is taken from Ausubel, Wernick, and Waggoner (2013).^v

The authors write: 'A combination of agricultural technologies raised yields, keeping downward pressure level on the extent of cropland, sparing land for nature.
Countering the global rising of population and affluence by parents and workers, consumers and farmers restrained the expansion of abundant country past irresolute tastes and lifting yields. The noticeable shrinkage in the extent of cropland as a part of the Crop Production index since 1990 provides encouragement that farmers volition continue sparing land.'

Land use categories

The following discussions on global state utilise (especially in relation to agriculture) encompass a number of definitions and combined categories. Information technology is therefore useful to understand the differences betwixt land use terminology; for instance, the definition of "arable country" versus "agricultural land".

To provide some clarity on the definitions used here (and the common terminology within the literature) we have visualised these state utilize categories and groupings in the chart shown here. Also shown are the definitions of each. The groupings and definitions shown beneath are based on the UN Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) and should therefore be consistent with about international data sources.

Definitions of agronomical land utilise

The Country Area of the Earth is xiii,003 million ha. four,889 million ha are classified as 'agricultural area' by the FAO (this is 37.6% of the Land Area).

The agricultural area use is divided into 3 categories: abundant land (28% of the global agronomical area), permanent crops (3%) and permanent meadows and pastures (69%) which account for the largest share of the earth's agricultural area.⁶

What practice these words hateful?

The agricultural area is the sum of abundant land, permanent crops, permanent meadows and pastures.

The FAO definition for arable land is state under temporary agricultural crops (multiple-cropped areas are counted only one time), temporary meadows for mowing or pasture, state under market and kitchen gardens and land temporarily dormant (less than five years). The abased land resulting from shifting cultivation is not included in this category. Information for "Arable land" are not meant to point the corporeality of land that is potentially cultivable.'^vii

The same source defines permanent crops as follows: 'Permanent crops are divided into temporary and permanent crops. Permanent crops are sown or planted in one case, and then occupy the country for some years and need not be replanted later each almanac harvest, such as cocoa, coffee and rubber. This category includes flowering shrubs, fruit trees, nut copse and vines, but excludes trees grown for wood or timber. And once again from the same source the definition for permanent meadows and pastures is 'land used permanently (5 years or more) to grow herbaceous forage crops, either cultivated or growing wild (wild prairie or grazing land).'

The FAO definition for fallow land is 'the cultivated land that is not seeded for 1 or more growing seasons. The maximum idle menstruation is usually less than v years.'

Information Sources

FAO Statistical Database (FAOstat)

Data: Many indicators relating to food production, yields and land use – the full listing is here.
Geographical coverage: Global – by country and earth region.
Time span: Since 1961.
Available at: Available for download here.

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Source: https://ourworldindata.org/land-use