In 2013, agricultural holdings occupied half of the area of the national territory, with the agricultural family population representing 6.5% of the resident population.
In recent years an increase of the size of farms and improvements on labour indicators occurred. Moreover the Unutilized Agricultural Area decreased by around 20% when compared with 2009, reaching the lowest value since there are statistical records (just over 100 thousand hectares).
The corporatisation of agriculture, expressed by the growing number of agricultural enterprises, has contributed to increase the efficiency of the sector, due to the adoption of more professional management processes and economies of scale. Although representing only 3.8% of the total holdings, the 10 thousand agricultural enterprises manage 1/3 of the UAA and almost half of the livestock.
However, comparison with the EU 28 countries still reveals an agriculture with small economic size holdings (only 17,100 Euros of standard output per farm, compared to the 25,000 Euros of EU 28), managed by aged farmers (the oldest ones in EU 28) who, in a large majority, only have practical training.
Few holders live only from agriculture (6.2%), with most of them supplementing their income with retirement and pensions (65.3%).
Nevertheless, the great majority of farmers (95.1%) intend to continue the agricultural activity in the coming years, pointing the affective value as the main reason for such decision (48.3%).