The average annual rate of agricultural output growth slowed globally in the 1970s and ‘80s, then accelerated in the ‘90s and aughts. In the latest period estimated, 2001-12, global output of total crop and livestock commodities was expanding at an average rate of 2.5 percent per year.
In the decades prior to 1990, most output growth came about from intensification of input use (such as using more labor, capital and material inputs per acre). Bringing new land into agricultural production and extending irrigation to existing agricultural land were also important sources of growth. This changed over the last two decades, as input growth slowed.
In the 2001-12 period, improvements in productivity—getting more output from existing resources—accounted for about two-thirds of the total growth in agricultural output worldwide, reflecting the use of new technology and changes in management practices by agricultural producers around the world.
The accompanying chart is based on the ERS data product, International Agricultural Productivity, updated October 2015.
Source: USDA Economic Research Service
