Hungry for land: small farmers feed the world with less than a quarter of all farmland

GRAIN | 28 May 2014 | Reports

It is commonly heard today that small farmers produce most of the world’s food. But how many of us realise that they are doing this with less than a quarter of the world’s farmland, and that even this meagre share is shrinking fast? If small farmers continue to lose the very basis of their existence, the world will lose its capacity to feed itself.

GRAIN took an in depth look at the data to see what is going on and the message is crystal clear. We need to urgently put land back in the hands of small farmers and make the struggle for agrarian reform central to the fight for better food systems.

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Alcides Raméon Ramírez, a member of one of 200 peasant families fighting to defend their land in Curuguaty, Paraguay. Eighty percent of the country’s land is in the hands of just two percent of landowners. (Photo: Pablo Tosco/Oxfam Intermon)