Results from the June 2012 Scottish Agricultural Census

2. Main findings

Compared with June 2011, these results show that :-

• Cereal areas increased by 10,600 hectares (2.4 per cent) to 457,700 hectares. Within this there was a move from winter to spring-planted crops, with an increase in spring barley of 26,300 hectares (10 per cent) and an increase in spring oats of 3,500 hectares (23.4 per cent). (Table 1a)
• The area of oilseed rape decreased by 1,800 hectares (4.7 per cent) to 36,600 hectares, but is still higher than most years in the last decade. (Table 1a)
• The area grown with potatoes decreased by 1,500 hectares (4.9 per cent) to 29,500 hectares, a 6.8 per cent decrease since 2009 following smaller decreases in the previous two years. (Table 1a)
• The total number of cattle decreased by 15,500 (0.9 per cent) to 1.79 million. This was a continuation of the trend since 2005. The number of cows in the beef herd decreased by 6,900 (1.5 per cent) whilst the number of cows in the dairy herd changed minimally. (Tables 3a and 3b)
• The total number of sheep fell by 65,200 (1.0 per cent) to 6.74 million. This was due to a decrease in lambs of 54,300 (1.6 per cent), and in ewes used for breeding of 18,000 (0.7 per cent) (Table 4)
• There was another decrease in the total number of pigs, by 26,600 (6.8 per cent) to 363,400. There was a decrease in the number of pigs for meat production of 22,200 (6.4 per cent). The pig breeding herd also decreased by 4,500 (12.3 per cent), though there was a slight increase in the number of gilts over 50kg to be used for breeding of 100 (2.0 per cent). (Table 5)
• The poultry flock increased by 167,600 (1.2 per cent) to 14.69 million. This was largely driven by an increase in broilers of 996,400 (12.3 per cent), though offset by falls of 663,500 (17.7 per cent) in the number of pullets and hens in the laying flock and 271,800 (22.3 per cent) in the number of breeding hens. (Table 6)
• The number of people working in agriculture was 68,400, up 630 compared with 2011. This included an increase of 660 (9.6 per cent) in the number of part time employees and an increase of 330 (2.6 per cent) in the number of working spouses. (Table 8)
• There has been a decrease of 72 holdings with tenancy agreements (1.1 per cent) to 6,670. (Table 9)