information about Icelandic agriculture
Information about Icelandic agriculture
Information about Icelandic agriculture
Dating back to the settlement of Iceland and way into the middle of last century, agriculture has been one of the primary industries in Iceland, together with the fishing industry. The settlers brought their livestock to Iceland, i.e. sheep, cattle, horses and pigs. The Icelandic cow, the horse and sheep have developed without any crossbreeding with foreign species. The Icelandic pig species disappeared; however, pig farming recovered late during the last century and is now yielding attractive results. The same applies to poultry farming, although the hen, frequently referred to as the settlement hen, is by en large maintained for cultural reasons due to its beauty and magnitude of colors.
The Ministry of Fisheries and Agriculture is responsible for Icelandic agriculture, including the utilization of land resources, international cooperation, the execution of free-trade treaties, pricing and business agreements in collaboration with the Ministry for Foreign Affairs, and also food safety, consumer issues, farmers' forestry efforts and the supervision of state-owned farmland.
The total size of Iceland is 103,022 square km. Vegetated land, grasslands, and cultivated areas cover about 27,000 square km. The number of farmlands in Iceland is about 3400 and the number of livestock owners is about 3200. Agriculture constitutes about 1.1% of the domestic production and has been decreasing. About 3.4% of Iceland's workforce is engaged in the agricultural sector.
Much emphasis has been placed on the purity, quality and health of the Icelandic agricultural products. The individual marking of livestock and the quality-certification system are aimed at sustainable production and constitute the foundations of product traceability.
The main types of livestock are sheep (450,000), cows and other cattle (65,000), horses (75,000), pigs (4,000) and poultry. Several types of vegetables are cultivated outdoors. Extensive greenhouse production takes place in areas with access to geothermal water, including various types of vegetables and flowers.
Sheep farming, dairy production and cattle farming have by en large taken place at many relatively small family farms, however, through the technological development in recent years, the number of farms has decreased, yet by the same token, their size has increased. In some instances large-farm owners have had to recruit employees for the farms.
The number of horses in Iceland has increased over the last few years. Today, the Icelandic horse is bred at farms, special horse-breeding farms, as well as being bred by individual horse owners. The Icelandic horse is not only popular in Iceland, but also abroad. Foreign people commonly seek work at the horse farms in order to learn about the Icelandic horse, how it feeds and to care for it, and to learn how to train and ride this magnificent animal.
Pork consumption has steadily increased in recent decades and Iceland is the venue of an impressive variety of pork production, which mainly takes place at large farms. The same applies to poultry, particularly chicken and eggs. This production mainly takes place at few but large facilities employing foreign and Icelandic workers alike.
Recent years have seen increased experimental cultivation of grain in Iceland. These experiments have proved to be quite promising; hence an increasing number of farmers is focusing on this agricultural option. Hitherto, most of the crops have been used as animal fodder; however, developments are ongoing for the growing of grain in Iceland for human consumption.
Experiments have furthermore taken place in recent years on organic agricultural production, including dairy products, potatoes, carrots and other vegetables, as well as eggs and meat. Although this production is still at a somewhat small scale, this interesting field of agricultural production is increasing and is warmly received by consumers; hence it is fair to say that it is here to stay!
Each field of agricultural production falls under the umbrella of a relevant national producer organization, where detailed information and statistics can be obtained about the number of farms, agricultural production and so forth. The farmers' national organization is called the Farmers Association of Iceland and its headquarters are at Baendahöllin at Hagatorg Square, 107 Reykjavík.