The State of Food and Agriculture 2025

Acknowledgements

The State of Food and Agriculture 2025 was prepared by a multidisciplinary team from the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), under the direction of David Laborde, Director of the Agrifood Economics and Policy Division, Andrea Cattaneo, Senior Economist and Editor of the publication, and Aslihan Arslan, Economist. Overall guidance was provided by Máximo Torero Cullen, Chief Economist, and by the management team of the Economic and Social Development stream.

RESEARCH AND WRITING TEAM
Theresa McMenomy, Marcus O’Neill, Elisa Ranuzzi, Ahmad Sadiddin, David McDonald (consulting editor) and Sara Vaz.

BACKGROUND PAPERS
Aslihan Arslan (FAO), Carlos Esteban Cabrera Cevallos (FAO), Solène Clémence (University of Bonn), Ana Paula de la O Campos (FAO), Guyo Dureti (University of Bonn), Hadi Hadi (University of Bonn), Kirara Homma (University of Bonn), Sarah Lowder (independent agricultural economist), Marcus O’Neill (FAO), Elisa Ranuzzi (FAO), Vincent Ricciardi (independent advisor), Alessandro Schioppa (University of Bonn), Sara Vaz (FAO) and David Wuepper (University of Bonn).

ADDITIONAL EXTERNAL CONTRIBUTIONS
Hongyi Cai (Leiden University), Ayşegül Çelik (Leiden University), Jordan Chamberlin (International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center [CIMMYT]), Jikun Huang (China Centre for Agricultural Policy), Scott Rozelle (Stanford University), Oliver Taherzadeh (Leiden University) and Natalia Volkow (National Institute of Statistics and Geography).

ADDITIONAL FAO INPUTS
Kushank Bajaj, Carlos Esteban Cabrera Cevallos, Diego Cattoval, Lorenzo de Simone, Nahid Naghizadeh, Tania Sharma, Francesco Tubiello, Feras Ziadat and Pablo Innecken Zuñiga.

FAO ADVISORY GROUP
Ward Anseeuw, Kushank Bajaj, Aurélie Brés, Carlos Esteban Cabrera Cevallos, Lucrezia Caon, Amparo Cerrato, Giulia Conchedda, Ana Paula de la O Campos, Lorenzo de Simone, Fabrice Edouard, Aziz Elbehri, Fidaa Haddad, Morten Hartvigsen, Judy Kariuki, Lamin Kijera, Livia Peiser, Francesco Maria Pierri, Ana Posas Guevara, Ann-Kristin Rother, Marta Ruiz Salvago, Marco Sanchez Cantillo, Antonio Scognamillo, Francesco Tubiello and Feras Ziadat.

PANEL OF EXTERNAL EXPERTS
Brendan Bayley (United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland His Majesty's Treasury), Uris Lantz Baldos (Purdue University), Jordan Chamberlin (CIMMYT), Klaus Deininger (World Bank), Carlos Eduardo Cerri (University of São Paulo), Javier Escobal D’Angelo (Group for the Analysis of Development), Hadi Hadi (University of Bonn), Jeff Herrick (United States Department of Agriculture until May 2025, then as independent scientist), Thomas Hertel (Purdue University), Michael Obersteiner (University of Oxford), Narcisa Gabriela Pricope (Mississippi State University), Deepak Ray (University of Minnesota), Vincent Ricciardi (Premise Data) and David Wuepper (University of Bonn).

ANNEXES
The annexes were prepared by Marcus O’Neill and Elisa Ranuzzi.

PRODUCTION SUPPORT
Alejandra Jimenez Tabares provided administrative support.

Translations were delivered by the Language Branch of the FAO Governing Bodies Servicing Division.

The Publications and Library Branch of the FAO Office of Communications provided editorial support, design and layout, as well as production coordination, for editions in all six official languages.

This flagship publication is part of The State of the World series of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.

Required citation:
FAO. 2025. The State of Food and Agriculture 2025 – Addressing land degradation across landholding scales. Rome.
https://doi.org/10.4060/cd7067en

The designations employed and the presentation of material in this information product do not imply the expression of any opinion whatsoever on the part of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) concerning the legal or development status of any country, territory, city or area or of its authorities, or concerning the delimitation of its frontiers or boundaries. Dashed lines on maps represent approximate border lines for which there may not yet be full agreement. The mention of specific companies or products of manufacturers, whether or not these have been patented, does not imply that these have been endorsed or recommended by FAO in preference to others of a similar nature that are not mentioned.

The views expressed in this information product are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views or policies of FAO.

ISSN 0081-4539 (print)
ISSN 1564-3352 (online)
ISBN 978-92-5-140142-2
© FAO, 2025

The Creative Commons Attribution license icon.

Some rights reserved. This work is made available under the Creative Commons Attribution- 4.0 International licence (CC BY 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode.en).

Under the terms of this licence, this work may be copied, redistributed and adapted, provided that the work is appropriately cited. In any use of this work, there should be no suggestion that FAO endorses any specific organization, products or services. The use of the FAO logo is not permitted. If a translation or adaptation of this work is created, it must include the following disclaimer along with the required citation: “This translation [or adaptation] was not created by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). FAO is not responsible for the content or accuracy of this translation [or adaptation]. The original English edition shall be the authoritative edition.”

Any dispute arising under this licence that cannot be settled amicably shall be referred to arbitration in accordance with the Arbitration Rules of the United Nations Commission on International Trade Law (UNCITRAL). The parties shall be bound by any arbitration award rendered as a result of such arbitration as the final adjudication of such a dispute.

Third-party materials. This Creative Commons licence CC BY 4.0 does not apply to non-FAO copyright materials included in this publication. Users wishing to reuse material from this work that is attributed to a third party, such as tables, figures or images, are responsible for determining whether permission is needed for that reuse and for obtaining permission from the copyright holder. The risk of claims resulting from infringement of any third-party-owned component in the work rests solely with the user.

FAO photographs. FAO photographs that may appear in this work are not subject to the above-mentioned Creative Commons licence. Queries for the use of any FAO photographs should be submitted to: photo-library@fao.org.

Sales, rights and licensing. FAO information products are available on the FAO website (www.fao.org/publications) and print copies can be purchased through the distributors listed there. For general enquiries about FAO publications please contact: publications@fao.org. Queries regarding rights and licensing of publications should be submitted to: copyright@fao.org.

RUSSIAN FEDERATION. Aerial view of cereal fields.