This report has been prepared by DG Agriculture and Rural Development with the support of Eurostat, as well as FIBL Research Institute of Organic Agriculture, Agrarmarkt Informations-Gesellschaft mbH for data on Germany and the Ministerium für ein Lebenswertes Österreich for data on Austria.

The organic sector in the EU has been rapidly developing during the past years. According to Eurostat data, the EU-28 had in 2015 a total area of 11.1 million hectares cultivated as organic, up from 5.0 million in 2002. During the last decade, organic area in the EU increased by about 500 000 hectares per year. This is a big increase, but the whole organic area represents only 6.2% of total utilised agricultural area in Europe.