Dataset · FAO
Land Under Cereal Production
63 years, 1961–2023 · 180 countries
This is how much land a country harvests cereals from, in hectares. Cereals — wheat, rice, maize, barley — supply most of the world's calories, so the area given over to them is one of the basic facts about a country's agriculture.
This site holds every year from 1961 to 2023, read from FAO’s own data and stored exactly as published.
Land Under Cereal Production · the file
- Newest
- Land Under Cereal Production, 2023
- Held
- 63 years · 10,318 rows
- Licence
- CC BY 4.0
0163 years
Every year
Every year comes from FAO’s 2026 release, recalculated on one method. Each opens the full table for that year; each downloads as a CSV.
| Year | Countries | Change | Read | Download |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Land Under Cereal Production, 2023Newest | 180 | ±0 | September 10, 2026 | CSV |
| Land Under Cereal Production, 2022 | 180 | ±0 | September 10, 2026 | CSV |
| Land Under Cereal Production, 2021 | 180 | −1 | September 10, 2026 | CSV |
| Land Under Cereal Production, 2020 | 181 | ±0 | September 10, 2026 | CSV |
| Land Under Cereal Production, 2019 | 181 | ±0 | September 10, 2026 | CSV |
| Land Under Cereal Production, 2018 | 181 | ±0 | September 10, 2026 | CSV |
| Land Under Cereal Production, 2017 | 181 | +1 | September 10, 2026 | CSV |
| Land Under Cereal Production, 2016 | 180 | ±0 | September 10, 2026 | CSV |
| Land Under Cereal Production, 2015 | 180 | +1 | September 10, 2026 | CSV |
| Land Under Cereal Production, 2014 | 179 | ±0 | September 10, 2026 | CSV |
| Land Under Cereal Production, 2013 | 179 | ±0 | September 10, 2026 | CSV |
| Land Under Cereal Production, 2012 | 179 | +1 | September 10, 2026 | CSV |
Show all 63 years
Every year in one file, one row per country per year: land-under-cereals-all-editions-nations-inquiry.csv
023 columns
What’s in the file
Every column, what it holds, how it is stored and what its values look like — what a reader needs before opening the file.
| Column | What it holds | Stored as | Range, 2023 | Distinct | Empty | Spread |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
CountrycountryName | The country’s name, as this file spells it. | Text | — | 180 | 0 | |
ISO Codecountry_codeIdentifier | The ISO 3166-1 alpha-3 code, added by this site. Every table here joins on it. | Text · 3 letters | — | 180 | 0 | |
Land under cereal production (hectares)land_under_cerealsHeadline | The headline figure: Land under cereal production (hectares). | Number · whole numbers | 02 share it103,715,108 Indiamiddle 689,278 | 179 | 0 |
Profiled from the newest file. Range: the lowest and highest value, with the country holding it when only one does. Spread: countries in ten equal steps from lowest to highest. Neither end is better. The values describe a shape, not a score.
03182 countries across every year
Who is covered
How many countries each year holds, continent by continent, who joined and who left, and which places this site covers that the dataset never has.
| 2012 | 2013 | 2014 | 2015 | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Africa | 52 | 52 | 52 | 52 | 52 | 52 | 52 | 52 | 52 | 52 | 52 | 52 |
| Americas | 34 | 34 | 34 | 34 | 34 | 34 | 34 | 34 | 34 | 34 | 34 | 34 |
| Asia | 47 | 47 | 47 | 47 | 47 | 47 | 47 | 47 | 47 | 47 | 47 | 47 |
| Europe | 38 | 38 | 38 | 39 | 39 | 39 | 39 | 39 | 39 | 39 | 39 | 39 |
| Oceania | 8 | 8 | 8 | 8 | 8 | 9 | 9 | 9 | 9 | 8 | 8 | 8 |
| All | 179 | 179 | 179 | 180 | 180 | 181 | 181 | 181 | 181 | 180 | 180 | 180 |
The newest 12 of 63 years.
Who joined and who left
− Nauru
+ Iceland
+ South Sudan
+ Montenegro
+ Serbia
+ Belgium
+ Luxembourg
+ Palestine
+ Czechia
+ Eritrea
+ SlovakiaNot in this dataset · 43 places this site covers
FAO gives no figure for these in any year held here. It is the publisher’s choice of scope, and each place’s profile shows what is measured.
American Samoa
Andorra
Anguilla
Aruba
Bahrain
Bermuda
British Virgin Islands
Cayman IslandsChannel Islands
Cook Islands
Curaçao
Equatorial Guinea
Faroe Islands
French Polynesia
Gibraltar
Greenland
Guam
Isle of Man
Kiribati
Kosovo
Liechtenstein
Macau
Marshall Islands
Monaco
Montserrat
NiueNorthern Cyprus
Northern Mariana Islands
Palau
Saint Kitts and Nevis
Saint Martin
Samoa
San Marino
Seychelles
Singapore
Sint MaartenSomaliland
Taiwan
Tonga
Turks and Caicos Islands
Tuvalu
United States Virgin Islands
Vatican City04Provenance
Where it comes from
The path from the publisher to this page, and what was checked and changed on the way.
1 · Publisher
Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)
2 · Their file
Land Under Cereal Production 2023
3 · Read by this site
September 10, 2026
Imported by a script that parses each figure and writes it down unrounded.4 · Stored as
63 files, one per year
Each downloads as a CSV, or every year together as land-under-cereals-all-editions-nations-inquiry.csv5 · Used on
Its statistic page, and every profile it measures
Precision
The headline is stored in whole numbers, as published.
Rounded by this site
Never. Tables on screen may show fewer decimals; the files never do.
Changed by this site
Reshaped into one row per country: regional and income-group totals are left out, only the columns listed are kept, each row gets its ISO 3166 code, and some country names are brought to one spelling. No value is recalculated, rescaled or rounded.
From FAOSTAT, served through the World Bank's indicator API (AG.LND.CREL.HA). FAOSTAT publishes harvested area in whole hectares.
05Reuse
Licence and credit
What the publisher’s licence lets you do, what it asks of you, and a credit line and citation ready to copy.
Licence · checked September 10, 2026
- Share and redistribute it
- Adapt it and build on it
- Use it commercially
- Credit the publisher
- Say what you changed
Share, adapt and use commercially. Credit the publisher and say if you changed anything.
A credit line
Source: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), Land Under Cereal Production, via Nations Inquiry.
Cite this dataset
Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). Land Under Cereal Production, 1961–2023 [data set]. As held by Nations Inquiry, https://nationsinquiry.com/datasets/land-under-cereals
The publisher’s own citation: FAO. FAOSTAT. Rome: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.
Plain-language summary, not legal advice. The licence text is what binds.
06Questions
Land Under Cereal Production: questions and answers
What is the Land Under Cereal Production?
This is how much land a country harvests cereals from, in hectares. Cereals — wheat, rice, maize, barley — supply most of the world's calories, so the area given over to them is one of the basic facts about a country's agriculture.
Which years of the Land Under Cereal Production can I download?
All 63, from 1961 to 2023, each as a CSV file, or every year together in one CSV.
Does FAO rank countries on it?
No. FAO publishes values only. The positions shown on this site are derived by ordering the published values, and are labelled as ours.
Can I use it commercially?
Yes, under CC BY 4.0, with credit to FAO. The licence text is linked on this page.