Worldwide Pesticide Use Holds Steady

The World Food and Agriculture Organization released its annual report on the state of global agriculture. The free 368-page report covers all areas of agriculture, from livestock to crops in all parts of the world.

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Here are some of the more interesting findings:

Pesticides Use Levels Off

Between 2012 and 2019, global pesticide use has held steady. Unfortunately, it leveled out after a 36% increase between 2000 and 2012. Also, that is a global percentage. Regions like the Americas reported a steady increase over the years, including between 2010 and 2019. In 2010, Asia lead the world in pesticide use by a good margin, but its pesticide use fell since then. It’s the only continent with a reduction since 2010.

The U.S. has maintained fairly low pesticide use, comparatively, at 2.54 kg per hectare in 2019. That’s slightly down from five years prior, when it reached a 20-year peak of 2.57 kg/ha in 2014.

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The Labor Shortage Is Worldwide

The global workforce dropped from 40% of the world’s population in 2000 to only 27% in 2020. In sheer numbers, most of those loses took place in Asia. The number of ag workers there fell from 800 million people to 590 million between 2000 and 2020. But Europe took the unfortunate lead in percentages. It lost 50% of its workforce, from 35 million in 2000 to 18 million between 2000 and 2020.

In a comparable timeline, worldwide crop production sharply — 53%. Cereals production represents about a third of crops produced worldwide in 2020, followed by sugar crops (24%), then vegetable crops and oil crops (12% each). Fruit and root/tuber crops claim 9% each of worldwide production.

Fruit production rose 57% between 2000 and 2019, driven mostly by bananas and plantains, watermelons, apples, oranges, and grapes. Vegetable production rose even more — 65% higher in 2019 than in 2000. The main vegetables behind the rise? Tomatoes, onions, cucumbers/gherkins, cabbages, and eggplants.

FAO primarily attributes the production increase to higher irrigation, pesticide, and fertilizer use. Regardless of the increase, there are significantly few farm workers available to cultivate the crops.

Nepal Leads the World in Female Farm Workers

The countries with the most women working in agriculture tend to be developing countries. Africa, Asia, and Oceania lay claim to the top 20 countries, with 15 of the 20 in Africa. More than 50% of ag workers in each of these countries are women.

But Nepal nabs the No. 1 slot by a decent margin, with 64% of its workers being female. The next highest country, Mozambique, falls under 60%.

Developed countries tend to have much smaller percentages of women working in agriculture. The U.S., for example, has only 25.7%. That number, however, is the highest its been since 2000, when it was only 23%

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