Arable land (hectares) - Country Ranking - Africa

Definition: Arable land (in hectares) includes land defined by the FAO as land under temporary crops (double-cropped areas are counted once), temporary meadows for mowing or for pasture, land under market or kitchen gardens, and land temporarily fallow. Land abandoned as a result of shifting cultivation is excluded.

Source: Food and Agriculture Organization, electronic files and web site.

See also: Thematic map, Time series comparison

Find indicator:
Rank Country Value Year
1 Nigeria 34,000,000.00 2018
2 Sudan 19,823,160.00 2018
3 Niger 17,700,000.00 2018
4 Ethiopia 16,187,000.00 2018
5 Tanzania 13,500,000.00 2018
6 South Africa 12,000,000.00 2018
7 Dem. Rep. Congo 11,800,000.00 2018
8 Algeria 7,505,017.00 2018
9 Morocco 7,477,600.00 2018
10 Uganda 6,900,000.00 2018
11 Mali 6,411,000.00 2018
12 Cameroon 6,200,000.00 2018
13 Burkina Faso 6,000,000.00 2018
14 Kenya 5,800,000.00 2018
15 Mozambique 5,650,000.00 2018
16 Chad 5,200,000.00 2018
17 Angola 4,900,000.00 2018
18 Ghana 4,700,000.00 2018
19 Zimbabwe 4,000,000.00 2018
20 Zambia 3,800,000.00 2018
21 Malawi 3,600,000.00 2018
22 Côte d'Ivoire 3,500,000.00 2018
23 Senegal 3,200,000.00 2018
24 Guinea 3,100,000.00 2018
25 Madagascar 3,000,000.00 2018
26 Egypt 2,910,969.00 2018
27 Benin 2,800,000.00 2018
28 Togo 2,650,000.00 2018
29 Tunisia 2,607,000.00 2018
30 Central African Republic 1,800,000.00 2018
31 Libya 1,720,000.00 2018
32 Sierra Leone 1,584,000.00 2018
33 Burundi 1,200,000.00 2018
34 Rwanda 1,151,700.00 2018
35 Somalia 1,100,000.00 2018
36 Namibia 800,000.00 2018
37 Eritrea 690,000.00 2018
38 Congo 550,000.00 2018
39 Liberia 500,000.00 2018
40 The Gambia 440,000.00 2018
41 Lesotho 429,300.00 2018
42 Mauritania 400,000.00 2018
43 Gabon 325,000.00 2018
44 Guinea-Bissau 300,000.00 2018
45 Botswana 259,600.00 2018
46 Eswatini 175,000.00 2018
47 Equatorial Guinea 120,000.00 2018
48 Mauritius 75,000.00 2018
49 Comoros 66,000.00 2018
50 Cabo Verde 50,000.00 2018
51 São Tomé and Principe 4,000.00 2018
52 Djibouti 2,000.00 2018
53 Seychelles 150.00 2018

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Development Relevance: Agricultural land covers more than one-third of the world's land area. Agricultural land constitutes only a part of any country's total area, which can include areas not suitable for agriculture, such as forests, mountains, and inland water bodies. Agriculture is still a major sector in many economies, and agricultural activities provide developing countries with food and revenue. But agricultural activities also can degrade natural resources. Poor farming practices can cause soil erosion and loss of soil fertility. Efforts to increase productivity by using chemical fertilizers, pesticides, and intensive irrigation have environmental costs and health impacts. Excessive use of chemical fertilizers can alter the chemistry of soil. Pesticide poisoning is common in developing countries. And salinization of irrigated land diminishes soil fertility. Thus, inappropriate use of inputs for agricultural production has far-reaching effects. There is significant geographic variation in the availability of land considered suitable for agriculture. Increasing population and demand from other sectors place growing pressure on available resources. According to FAO, the world's cultivated area has grown by 12 percent over the last 50 years. The global irrigated area has doubled over the same period, accounting for most of the net increase in cultivated land. Agriculture already uses 11 percent of the world's land surface for crop production. It also makes use of 70 percent of all water withdrawn from aquifers, streams and lakes. Agricultural policies have primarily benefitted farmers with productive land and access to water, bypassing the majority of small-scale producers who are still locked in a poverty trap of high vulnerability, land degradation and climatic uncertainty. Land resources are central to agriculture and rural development, and are intrinsically linked to global challenges of food insecurity and poverty, climate change adaptation and mitigation, as well as degradation and depletion of natural resources that affect the livelihoods of millions of rural people across the world. In many industrialized countries, agricultural land is subject to zoning regulations. In the context of zoning, agricultural land (or more properly agriculturally zoned land) refers to plots that may be used for agricultural activities, regardless of the physical type or quality of land.

Limitations and Exceptions: The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) tries to impose standard definitions and reporting methods, but complete consistency across countries and over time is not possible. Thus, data on agricultural land in different climates may not be comparable. For example, permanent pastures are quite different in nature and intensity in African countries and dry Middle Eastern countries. The data collected by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations from official national sources through the questionnaire are supplemented with information from official secondary data sources. The secondary sources cover official country data from websites of national ministries, national publications and related country data reported by various international organizations. Data on agricultural land are valuable for conducting studies on a various perspectives concerning agricultural production, food security and for deriving cropping intensity among others uses. Agricultural land indicator, along with land-use indicators, can also elucidate the environmental sustainability of countries' agricultural practices. True comparability of the data is limited, however, by variations in definitions, statistical methods, and quality of data. Countries use different definitions land use. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the primary compiler of the data, occasionally adjusts its definitions of land use categories and revises earlier data. Because the data reflect changes in reporting procedures as well as actual changes in land use, apparent trends should be interpreted cautiously. Satellite images show land use that differs from that of ground-based measures in area under cultivation and type of land use. Moreover, land use data in some countries (India is an example) are based on reporting systems designed for collecting tax revenue. With land taxes no longer a major source of government revenue, the quality and coverage of land use data have declined.

Statistical Concept and Methodology: Temporary fallow land refers to land left fallow for less than five years. The abandoned land resulting from shifting cultivation is not included in this category. Data for "Arable land" are not meant to indicate the amount of land that is potentially cultivable.

Periodicity: Annual