Land use statistics by country
Land use statistics by country is a global accounting of how humanity has divided the earth beneath its feet. The world's total cultivated land adds up to roughly 17.2 million square kilometers, covering just under 12 percent of the planet's land surface. That figure is the sum of two distinct categories: arable land and permanent cropland. Each has a precise definition that shapes every number in the table.
Arable land is ground that farmers till and replant after every harvest. Wheat, maize, and rice grow here, their cycles defined by seasons and plows. Permanent cropland works differently. Citrus groves, coffee plantations, and rubber trees are not yanked out and reseeded each year. Flowering shrubs, fruit trees, elm trees, and vines also belong to this category. Forests grown specifically for timber do not.
The percentage figures for arable land, permanent crops, and all other land types come from the CIA World Factbook. Total land area figures follow the same source. The total area of a country, under this dataset, means the sum of both land area and water area together. All other figures, including the total cultivated land area that determines each country's ranking, were calculated from that foundation.
What the numbers reveal is a planet whose agricultural footprint is concentrated in a small number of countries, while dozens of nations cultivate only a fraction of one percent of the earth's farmed surface. The definitions, the source, and the ranking method all shape what we see. The stories those figures tell are worth examining closely.
Arable land carries a strict definition. It must be cultivated for crops that require replanting after each harvest. Wheat, maize, and rice are the reference examples given in the dataset. A field that produces any of these, year after year with plowing and reseeding, qualifies. What matters is the cycle of cultivation and renewal.
Permanent cropland covers a different relationship between farmer and soil. Citrus, coffee, and rubber are the defining examples. These crops persist across multiple seasons without being uprooted. The land also includes flowering shrubs, fruit trees, and vines, as well as elm trees. The key distinction is that the plants remain after harvest.
One exclusion is deliberate and significant. Land under trees grown specifically for wood or timber falls outside both categories. A rubber plantation counts as permanent cropland. A timber plantation does not. The dataset draws a line between trees that yield food and fiber without felling and trees whose purpose is the wood itself.
The third category, labeled "other lands," absorbs everything that does not fit the first two. Permanent meadows and pastures belong here. So do forests and woodlands, built-on areas, roads, and barren land. The breadth of this catch-all category means it dominates the landscape figures for many of the countries near the bottom of the ranking table. Understanding what gets excluded is as important as understanding what gets counted.
Percentage figures for arable land, permanent cropland, and other lands all trace back to the CIA World Factbook. The total land area figures come from the same source. The dataset calculates everything else, including the total cultivated land areas that rank each country, from those foundational numbers.
The dates attached to individual country entries span from 2002 to 2023, which means the table is not a snapshot of a single moment. Most entries carry a 2011 date. A number of entries show 2016 data. A handful of the smallest territories use 2005 figures. Some show 2020 or 2023 data. Readers comparing two countries are sometimes comparing figures measured a decade apart.
For countries at the bottom of the ranking, the data frequently rounds to the nearest ten square kilometers. Entries showing 10, 20, or 30 square kilometers of cultivated land reflect both the genuine smallness of those territories and the precision limits of the underlying measurement. Several of the smallest entries record zero square kilometers of either arable land or permanent cropland, meaning their entire cultivated total comes from one category alone.
The per-capita figures, which express arable land area per person, are also drawn from this dataset for the countries where they appear. Where the source provides no per-capita figure, the table records a dash. The absence of a dash in a particular entry is itself informative. Countries with notably high per-capita arable land tend to be large nations with smaller populations relative to their farmed area.
The world's total cultivated land reaches roughly 17.2 million square kilometers, of which about 15.8 million square kilometers qualifies as arable. The highest-ranked individual entry in the table, measured by total cultivated area, shows more than 1.76 million square kilometers of cultivated land, representing 53.7 percent of that country's total land area, with data dated to 2020. That single national figure represents more than ten percent of all cultivated land on earth.
The second entry in the ranking shows roughly 1.68 million square kilometers of cultivated land, accounting for 17.1 percent of its total land area, also dated 2020. Its permanent cropland portion is comparatively small at about 29,800 square kilometers. Per-capita arable land here reaches 4.9 units, among the higher readings in the upper portion of the table.
The third-ranked entry, with data from 2023, records about 1.48 million square kilometers total, at 15.4 percent of its land area. Its permanent crop share comes to roughly 201,000 square kilometers. The fourth-ranked entry, from 2011, shows just over 1.26 million square kilometers, with only 0.1 percent of its land area in permanent crops but a per-capita arable figure of 8.6.
By the time the ranking reaches its fifth entry, total cultivated land has fallen to about 800,000 square kilometers. The steep dropoff from the top entries to those that follow reflects how agricultural land is not distributed proportionally around the world. A small number of very large countries hold a disproportionate share of the earth's farmed surface, and the per-capita figures for those nations are not always the highest in the table.
Permanent cropland occupies 1.0 percent of global land area in this dataset, reaching roughly 1.55 million square kilometers worldwide. That figure is significantly smaller than the global arable land total, but for some countries it represents the dominant form of cultivation.
One entry in the table shows a permanent crop percentage of 40.6 percent of the country's total land area, against a 9.1 percent arable share, with 2011 data. For that country, nearly half of all land is under permanent crops while less than a tenth is arable. Another entry records 48.0 percent of its total area as permanent crops while only 2.7 percent is arable, also from 2011. A third shows 45.7 percent permanent crops against 5.7 percent arable.
At the other end of the spectrum, many entries in the table record zero permanent cropland. These are countries where the entire cultivated area is arable land. The entry showing 0.4 percent of land under cultivation, with no permanent cropland at all, appears multiple times at different absolute sizes.
The contrast between countries dominated by permanent crops and those with none at all reflects underlying differences in climate, crop type, and agricultural tradition. Rubber and coffee grow in different latitudes than wheat and maize. The definitions used in this dataset are designed to capture that fundamental difference in how different parts of the world farm their land. One entry near the bottom of the ranking records 66.7 percent of its total land area as permanent crops, the highest percentage in the entire table, with 2005 data.
Near the bottom of the ranking, absolute areas shrink to tens of square kilometers, but the percentage figures sometimes reach their most striking values. An entry with only 17 square kilometers of cultivated land, dated 2005, records 66.7 percent of its total land area under permanent crops. Its arable area is zero. Every cultivated hectare is devoted to permanent crops.
Multiple entries with 2005 dates record total cultivated areas between 9 and 100 square kilometers. Some show over half of their land area cultivated, even as the raw area is smaller than many individual farms in larger countries. One entry at 100 square kilometers records 55.6 percent cultivated land. Another at 100 square kilometers records just 0.5 percent.
The pattern of round numbers in the smallest entries reflects data precision rather than coincidence. Areas of 10, 20, 30, and 40 square kilometers appear frequently among entries with 2005 dates. These figures represent the limits of measurement accuracy for very small territories, not necessarily exact boundaries.
A 2002-dated entry is the oldest data point in the entire table, at 51 square kilometers of cultivated land. The most recent entries, dated 2023, appear at the upper end of the ranking. The spread of measurement dates across more than two decades means the table captures land use at different points in time for different countries. The per-capita arable figure for the fourth-ranked entry, at 8.6, is one of the higher readings in the table, though territories with extremely small populations and any meaningful arable area can push per-capita ratios to values that dwarf those of the major agricultural nations.
Common questions
What is the total cultivated land area in the world according to land use statistics by country?
Global cultivated land totals roughly 17.2 million square kilometers, covering about 11.6 percent of the world's land surface. This figure combines approximately 15.8 million square kilometers of arable land with roughly 1.55 million square kilometers of permanent cropland.
What is the difference between arable land and permanent cropland in the land use statistics dataset?
Arable land is cultivated for crops like wheat, maize, and rice that are replanted after each harvest. Permanent cropland covers crops like citrus, coffee, and rubber that are not replanted after harvest, along with flowering shrubs, fruit trees, elm trees, and vines. Land under trees grown for wood or timber is excluded from both categories.
Where do the land use statistics by country figures come from?
Percentage figures for arable land, permanent cropland, and other land types come from the CIA World Factbook, as do total land area figures. All other figures, including total cultivated land areas used for ranking, are calculated from that foundational data.
What counts as other lands in the land use statistics by country table?
Other lands include all territory that is neither arable nor under permanent crops. This encompasses permanent meadows and pastures, forests and woodlands, built-on areas, roads, and barren land.
How are countries ranked in the land use statistics by country table?
Countries are ranked by total cultivated land area, which is the sum of total arable land area and total permanent cropland area. The ranking does not use percentage of land cultivated, but absolute area in square kilometers.
What years do the land use statistics by country data cover?
Data dates range from 2002 to 2023. Most country entries carry a 2011 date, several show 2016 figures, some of the smallest territories use 2005 data, and a few entries at the top of the ranking show 2020 or 2023 measurements.
All sources
3 references cited across the entry
- 1inlineCIA World Factbook-Land Use
- 2inlineCIA World Factbook-Area