News: State of Food and Agriculture (SOFA) 2025 report released on November 3, 2025 by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations.
About State of Food and Agriculture (SOFA) Report 2025
- The SOFA 2025 report offers an in-depth assessment of the ways in which human-induced land degradation affects agricultural productivity, food security, and the resilience of ecosystems.
- Theme of the report 2025: Addressing land degradation across landholding scales
- Key Findings:
- Nearly 1.7 billion people live in regions where agricultural output is shrinking due to land degradation caused by human activity.
- This degradation is severely eroding agricultural productivity, threatening food security, and damaging ecosystems.
- India ranks among the countries with the highest yield losses from human-induced land degradation.
- Impact on Agricultural Land Use: Between 2001 and 2023, total agricultural land fell by 78 million hectares (mha) — a 2% decline globally.
- Within this period: Cropland expanded by 78 mha and permanent meadows and pastures shrank by 151 mha
- Agricultural expansion continues to be the primary driver of global deforestation, accounting for nearly 90% of forest loss.
- Land Abandonment and Restoration Potential: Around 3.6 mha of cropland are abandoned annually, with land degradation being a major contributing factor.
- Reversing just 10% of human-induced degradation on existing croplands could feed an additional 154 million people annually.
- Restoring abandoned croplands could provide enough production to feed between 292 and 476 million people.
- Vulnerability Hotspots and Human Toll
- Land degradation, poverty, and food insecurity intersect to form vulnerability hotspots, especially in Southern Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa.
- In these regions, declining land quality overlaps with high poverty and childhood stunting.
- Approximately 47 million children under five suffering from stunted growth live in areas with severe yield losses due to degradation.
- Farm Size and Degradation Dynamics: Farm size plays a critical role in land management and productivity:
- Large farms often invest in advanced technologies that improve resource efficiency but can accelerate land degradation through intensive use.
- Small farms face resource constraints and market barriers, which worsen vulnerability to degradation.
- Global farm structure:
- 85% of the world’s 570 million farms are smaller than 2 hectares, managing only 9% of global farmland.
- The largest 0.1% of farms (over 1,000 hectares each) control about half of all agricultural land.
- Regional Patterns of Impact
- Eastern and Southern Asia are the most affected regions, given their high population density and extensive degradation.
- Sub-Saharan Africa: Cropland expanded by 69 mha, but forest loss reached 72 mha. Experiences large yield gaps, primarily due to resource constraints rather than degradation alone.
- Latin America: Cropland grew by 25 mha, while deforestation totaled 85 mha.
- Europe and North America show a strong correlation between historical degradation and current yield losses.
- Smallholder Contribution: Despite facing limited access to land, credit, inputs, and markets, the world’s 500 million smallholder farmers make significant contributions to global food supply.
- They provide 16% of global dietary energy,12% of global protein, and 9% of global fat from crops.
- Smallholders are vital for local agrifood systems, dietary diversity, and high-value crops that enhance rural livelihoods.
- Large-scale operations, which dominate globally traded commodities, have outsized influence on food availability.
- The report stresses their critical responsibility to adopt sustainable land management practices to prevent further degradation.
- Key recommendation: Urgent action is needed to:
- Restore degraded lands,
- Adopt sustainable farming practices,
- Protect vulnerable communities, and
- Balance productivity with ecosystem preservation.
