The crisis of food security is coming home to workers in the food sector. The Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FAO), says employment in the global food system is strinking by the day. This alarm was raised in its recent FAOSTAT report, claiming that the global share of employment in Agrifood Systems (AFS) has decreased significantly.
According to the report, employment in agriculture, forestry, and fishing decreased from 1 billion people in 2000 to 892 million in 2022.
The UN body attributed this decline to an increase in the “share of non-agricultural employment in agrifood systems potentially driven by economic diversification and industrialisation.”
The FAOSTAT report also cited “status in employment, divisions of agriculture, and hours worked of the people employed in agriculture, forestry, and fishing, and in rural areas by sex and age whenever possible” as factors for the decline.
According to the report, Africa leads with 64.5 percent of employment in AFS, highlighting a “strong reliance on agrifood systems,” while Asia followed with 41.5 percent, reflecting both “agrarian economies alongside growing industrialisation.”
The report noted that the Americas hold a “22.4 percent share in total employment, followed by Oceania at 18.7 percent, and Europe at 14.7 percent, indicating more diversified economies with a lower reliance on AFS employment.”
Globally, the agricultural sector makes up 67.5 percent of agrifood system employment, though regional differences are substantial.
The UN body said America, Europe, and Oceania focus on off-farm activities like food processing, services, trade, transportation, and non-food agricultural manufacturing to create agrifood employment.
By contrast, “Africa and Asia primarily rely on farming for agrifood jobs where agricultural employment within agrifood systems ranges from 74.4 percent in Africa to just 34.8 percent in Europe,” the report said.
Non-agricultural employment in agrifood systems (AFS) has remained stable at around 13 percent of total global employment over the past two decades, with “Africa as the only region experiencing growth in this sector,” FAO revealed.
It noted that in 2021, non-agricultural AFS employment reached 16.5 percent in Africa, followed by the Americas at 12.8 percent, Asia at 12.4 percent, Oceania at 11.9 percent, and Europe, which had the lowest share at 9.6 percent.
The Chief Statistician and Director of the FAO Statistics Division, José Rosero Moncayo, said the expanded FAOSTAT responds to a critical need to improve the availability of employment data to inform the transformation of agrifood systems.
The report, Moncayo said, “Offers a better picture of how many people are working in agrifood systems around the world and highlights their key role in feeding the planet.”
