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THE GROWTH OF WORLD AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTION, 1800–1938

Research in Economic History

ISBN: 978-0-76231-119-4, eISBN: 978-1-84950-282-5

Publication date: 11 December 2004

Abstract

World population has increased six-fold in the last two centuries, and thus agricultural production must have grown as well. The last fifty years of this increase are covered by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) production series. This article aims to push our quantitative knowledge back in time as far as possible. It reviews the scattered evidence on agricultural production in the first half of the 19th century, estimates a yearly series of output for the main countries since 1870, and puts forward some guesstimates on trends in the rest of the world. In the long run, agricultural production has increased more than population. Growth has affected all continents, even if it has been decidedly faster in both the countries of Western Settlement and in Eastern Europe, than in Asia or in Western Europe. It was faster before World War I, a veritable golden age for world agriculture, than in the inter-war years. The composition of production has changed as well, with an increase in the share of livestock products.

Citation

Federico, G. (2004), "THE GROWTH OF WORLD AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTION, 1800–1938", Research in Economic History (Research in Economic History, Vol. 22), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 125-181. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0363-3268(04)22003-1

Publisher

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Emerald Group Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2004, Emerald Group Publishing Limited