Increasing Agricultural Productivity:
Encouraging Foreign Direct Investments in the COMCEC Region
6
Figure 2: Size of the Agricultural Population in 2000 and 2010 .
Source: SESRIC, 2013.
A decline in agriculture’s share of employment at a faster rate than the inevitable decline in
agriculture’s share of GDP is a necessary condition for the reduction of the rural-urban gap in
living standards. In this context, migration out of agriculture is a necessary condition of healthy,
poverty-alleviating development10.
1.2 Land Use
The agricultural sector can only flourish if the production factors - land, capital and labour - are
sufficiently available. Available land can be used for totally different agricultural purposes and
Table 1 distinguishes three main uses of arable land: arable land, permanent crops and
permanent pasture.
Table 1: Land Use in Agriculture (2011)
Countries
Total
Land Area
Agricultural
area
Arable Land Permanent Crops Permanent Pasture
Million
Hectare
Million
Hectare
% of
Land
Area
Million
hectare
% of
agricultural
area
Million
hectare
% of
agricultural
area
Million
hectare
% of
agricultural
area
COMCEC 3,129 1,392 44.5 293 20.7 55.2 3.8 1,043 75.7
Developing 9,767 4,160 38.6 942 27.1 118 3.4 3,091 69.6
World 13,003 4,911 37.6 1396 28.3 153 3.1 3,358 68.7
Source: Author’s own calculations using FAOSTAT 2013
Table 1 shows that 44.5 percent of total land area in the COMCEC Member Countries is
considered agricultural land, compared to 38.6 percent in developing countries and only 37.6
percent at world level. In absolute terms this is equal to a total amount of 1,392 million hectares.
10 IFAD, 2007.
42,3%
49,0%
42,2%
36,2%
43,9%
38,0%
20%
30%
40%
50%
60%
COMCEC Countries Developing Countries World
2000
2010