ABSTRACT
Global grain harvested area shrank to 684 million hectares in 1998, a drop of more than 6 million hectares or 1 percent from 1997. 1 (See Figure 1.) Since the historic high in 1981, grain harvested area has declined 48 million hectares, a 7-percent drop. 2 And grain area harvested per person—at 0.12 hectares—has plummeted to half the 1950 level. 3 (See Figure 2.) In contrast to the rest of agricultural history, the near tripling in production since 1950 has come largely from yield increases, rather than from bringing more land under the plow.
