Family farming continues to be subsistence

Agriculture in Peru continues to be mostly family and subsistence, as revealed by the latest National Agrarian Survey (ENA 2022) carried out by the National Institute of Statistics and Information Technology (INEI).

The study presented last Monday indicates that the 97.6% of the agriculture that is developed in the country is familiar. This means that the producers have crop areas of less than 10 hectares and do not employ permanent workers.

The alarming thing about this figure is that close to half of this type of agriculture, 49.3%, is for critical subsistence. This implies that these farmers work with an extension of less than 2 hectares of crops, do not use certified seeds and lack irrigation systems, he explains. Dante Carhuavilcahead of the INEI.

While 38.7% are classified as non-critical subsistence, that is, they have between 2 and 5 hectares of crops and at least have access to certified seeds or some irrigation system.

Most of the critical family farming is distributed in 10 regions of the jungle and the mountains. Cajamarca, Loreto, Amazonas, San Martín, Puno, Junín, etc. stand out.

Instead, most of the non-critical subsistence family farming is on the coast in regions such as Piura, Tumbes, Lambayeque, Áncash, Lima, Ica, Arequipa, among others.

Within family farming, intermediate farming with the least potential, the one with the greatest potential and the consolidated represent 5.2%, 5.4% and 1.4%respectively.

On the other hand, according to ENA 2022, Peruvian agriculture is mainly characterized by being rainfed, that is, it depends on rainfall, representing 63.7%. In contrast, only 36.3% of agricultural activities are carried out under irrigation.

Analysis of the ENA 2022

Mariana Escobar, representative of the FAO in Peru, highlights that the ENA 2022 confirms several forecasts of how family farming continued in the country. “(Which is) a substantially subsistence agriculture, poor, informal, with low land titles,” he comments.

In addition, he stresses that these data reveal that the food security of agricultural producers is not guaranteed.

Finally, Escobar highlights that the ENA 2022 shows insufficient access to irrigation and natural resources.

Data

Area. 44.9% of the country’s total area is agricultural, and of that percentage, 51.6% has crops.

Size. The majority of agricultural units (55.6%) are between 0.5 and 4.9 ha.

The word

Mariana Escobar, FAO Peru

“It is important to put on the table structural aspects of the agricultural and rural sector of the country, as this gives very clear lights on where and on whom to focus public investment.”