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Farmland Use - Grassland and fodder crops

GRASSLAND AND FODDER CROPS

Introduction

There are 6,190,000 hectares of agricultural land including common grazings in Scotland. The vast majority of agricultural land is most suitable for the grazing of livestock or for the production of fodder crops and silage.

Table : Forage area statistics 1985 to 2007 (hectares)







Hectares
198519901995200020052007
Grassland
Grass for mowing
350,347342,117337,331322,488317,007317,486
Grass for grazing
734,417787,634821,216864,385917,726917,663
Total grass
1,084,7641,129,7511,158,5471,186,8731,234,7331,235,149


Fodder crops
Turnips and swedes
36,38527,01417,84911,3317,5556,486
Kale and cabbage
3,0923,4713,1032,5912,5122,887
Rape
9,0475,4603,8873,3173,1352,944
Other fodder crops
3,8102,9253,7447,02612,06812,406
Total fodder crops
52,33438,87028,58224,26525,27124,722


Rough grazing
3,840,3383,695,6813,574,7833,399,7673,342,3153,401,695
Common grazing
592,096590,782583,729582,822598,472594,440


Total forage area
5,569,5325,455,0845,345,6415,193,7265,200,7915,256,005

The links listed below provide tables of more detailed grass and fodder crop statistics. To return to this page use the BACK button on your browser.

FURTHER INFORMATION

More agricultural statistics and information including the Economic Report on Scottish Agriculture, geographic and time series summaries of agricultural census results and details of farm incomes, subsidies and production are available from our agricultural statistics publications. To return to this page use the BACK button on your browser.

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Page updated: Friday, October 24, 2008