Spain has been one of the most dynamic EU states in the field of organic farming and stands out as the country where the organic acreage has grown the most between 2000 and 2013, reaching 1.6 million hectares, 4.6 times more; well above the EU average, which has doubled.





This has been revealed in the study on "The organic sector in the European Union", published this week by Agence Bio, the French agency for the development and promotion of organic farming, which states that Spain is also the EU country with the largest acreage devoted to organic agriculture.





61% of the total organic acreage in the EU-28, which amounted to 10.3 million hectares in 2013, concentrates in six countries, with Spain in the lead (16%), followed by Italy (13% and 1.3 million), France (10% and 1.06 million), Germany (10% and 1.06 million), Poland (6% and 675,000) and the UK (5% and 575,349 hectares).





Spain, with 30,502 organic farms, is also among the countries with the highest number of them at EU level, only behind Italy (45,969).





Six states of the EU-28 have 68% of the 257,323 organic farms, with Italy (18%) and Spain (12%) in first and second place, respectively, followed by Poland (10 %), France (10%), Greece (9%) and Germany (9%).





Regarding the Utilised Agricultural Area (UAA) for organic agriculture, while Spain is also above the European average, which amounts to 5.7%, it is far surpassed by Austria, which, with 19.7%, is the country devoting the largest agricultural area to this production method.





Spain (6.47%) is here in twelfth place, and in addition to Austria, Sweden (16.5%), Estonia (16.3%), the Czech Republic (11.7%), Latvia (11%), Italy (10.3%), Finland (9%), Slovakia (8.4%), Portugal (8.1%), Slovenia (8%) and Denmark (6.9%) are also ahead.





Furthermore, the report stresses the progress made by Andalusia, which currently accounts for half of the Spanish organic agricultural acreage; in 2000, that percentage was of just 18%.