Rome – Publicly-oriented agricultural research and development (R&D) systems have been growing at an average annual rate of 1.8 percent in the past two decades, reaching $50.4 billion in 2023, while the number of agricultural researchers has grown even faster, new data presented today by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO).
The figures encompass a relative surge since 2009 after sluggish expansion in the first decade of the millennium.
The findings come from a new data domain available to all on FAO’s FAOSTAT portal, the world’s most comprehensive data base for agricultural themes. The new service represents the development, expansion of coverage and frequency, and technical improvements of a service that began in 1981 as a joint venture between the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) and the former International Service for National Agricultural Research (ISNAR) to collect agricultural research data. It is now brought back to FAO in an effort to institutionalize it with our Member countries, thanks to a grant from the Gates Foundation.
Agricultural Science and Technology Indicators (ASTI), such as those contained in FAOSTAT’s new domain, are in demand to assess research performance and impact, and to set policy and investment priorities to increase agricultural growth and productivity. Agricultural R&D is associated with lowering food prices and high economic returns, and it is increasingly central to improving the efficiency of resource utilization, lowering carbon footprints and producing more output with fewer inputs such as land, labour and chemicals, and enabling key food crops to adapt to changing environmental conditions
“This new domain will strengthen evidence-based policymaking and advocacy for more effective agricultural research systems. It addresses a longstanding gap by providing, for the first time, a regular, globally agreed framework to monitor agricultural R&D. This represents an important milestone, enabling countries to set and track commitments on investment and research capacity through a harmonized measure of national efforts that generate benefits for all, recognizing science and technology as global public goods.” said FAO Chief Statistician José Rosero Moncayo.
The data can be accessed here and here , while an accompanying analytical brief presents global, regional and country-level trends in public agricultural R&D from 2004 to 2023. Data is present for more than 120 FAO Member states, with more to be added later in the year.
The brief also highlights changes over time in both research capacity and expenditure, as well as persistent disparities in the scale and intensity of investment across national agricultural research systems.
Key findings
Globally in 2023, the equivalent of 316 000 full-time experts were engaged in public agricultural R&D systems, up from 204 000 in 2004.
Measured in constant 2015 purchasing power parities, global public expenditure in this sector amounted to $50.4 billion, up from $35.9 billion in 2004.
Asia accounts for the largest share, home to 45 percent of the world’s agricultural researchers in 2023, followed by Europe at 24 percent, Americas at 14 percent, Africa at 13 percent and Oceania with 3 percent.
Trends in this sector vary sharply, the highest growth rate over the period was in Central Asia reporting with the largest decline in Southern Africa .
Spending on public agricultural R&D shows a broadly similar pattern, with Asia accounting for 48 percent of the global total, followed by Americas at 22 percent, Europe at 20 percent, Africa at 8 percent and Oceania at 3 percent.
The fastest growth in expenditures over the period was in Central Asia, followed by East and South Asia; while Southern Europe recorded the largest decline.
The ratio of agricultural researchers per 100 000 agricultural workers varies considerably around the world, ranging from 5 to 1 692, while countries spent on average around 1.3 percent of the value-added generated in their agricultural sectors on agricultural research, with a median of 0.6 percent. Countries with the highest values included Belgium, Denmark, Switzerland, Republic of Korea, and Slovenia.
Between-country variation reflects a host of variables including national income levels, the size of a country’s agricultural sector, trade dynamics, and issues of scale. The granular FAO data will allow for closer and more contextually robust analysis of needs and best practices in the pursuit of sustainable agrifood systems
