Agriculture in Germany - statistics & facts
Germany currently has the largest population in the EU. It is also one of the richest countries in Europe. But how sufficient is its agriculture for the population's needs? The number of agricultural businesses has dwindled significantly. If there were around 904,700 businesses in 1975, in 2024 there were 255,000. On the one hand, in recent years farmers were displeased with new agricultural legislation, which led to the so-called tractor protests around the country. Other issues also influence keeping businesses alive, such as deliveries to and from abroad, as well as hiring workers from other countries during harvest season. On the other hand, industrial and technological advancements have allowed for work which required copious amounts of labor in previous decades to be completed with less human interaction. Employee numbers have been decreasing since the 1990s.
