FAO's latest edition of the Statistical Yearbook published

FAO has released the 2013 edition of the Statistical Yearbook, which once again sheds light on the impact of agriculture on global warming, trends in hunger and malnutrition, and the state of the natural resource base on which world food production depends.

The latest data available in the Statistical Yearbook show that agricultural greenhouse gas emissions increased by 1.6 per cent per year in the decade after 2000, reaching 5 billion tons of carbon dioxide equivalent in 2010, which is equivalent to 10 per cent of all anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions. Among the different sectors of agriculture, livestock activities and the use of fertilizers are the largest sources of emissions.

In 2010-2012, nearly 0.87 billion of the undernourished population, 12.5 per cent of the world's population, lived overwhelmingly (0.852 billion) in developing countries. Global crop production has expanded threefold in the past 50 years, mainly through increased yields per unit area and crop intensification. The global per capita food supply increased from about 2200 kcal/day in the early 1960 s to 2800 kcal/day in 2009. Europe's current food supply per capita is 3370 kcal/day, the highest in the world. Cereals are the most important source of food for human consumption, with 1 billion tons for human consumption and 0.75 billion tons for animal feed out of the 2.3 billion tons produced annually.

After a decade of slowing growth in the 1990 s, global public spending on agricultural research and development rose steadily, from $26.1 billion in 2000 to $31.7 billion in 2008. Most of the growth came from developing countries, with China and India accounting for nearly half of it. Other countries, notably Argentina, Brazil, Iran, Nigeria and Russia, also saw significant increases in public spending on agricultural R & D. However, there are many negative developments in many of the smaller and more technologically backward poor countries. In addition, the agricultural sector has shown remarkable resilience in the global economic turmoil as a result of high agricultural commodity prices. In 2010, the value added of agriculture worldwide increased by 4%, while the overall GDP increased by 1%.

http://www.fao.org/docrep/018/i3107e/i3107e.PDF

(Responsible editor: Shixin)