Over 1m ha of land is farmed in NI

The latest Statistical Review published by DAERA shows there was approximately 1.04m ha of land farmed in NI during 2024.

The review, which includes comprehensive economic and physical data from across the agri-food sector, shows the total number of farms in June last year stood at 26,190, leaving the average sized farm at just under 40ha.

Most NI farms (92%) keep cattle or sheep, with cattle present on 20,232 farms (77%) and sheep on 10,026 farms (38%).

Cattle numbers have remained stable at around 1.67m, although the number of dairy cows in June 2024 was up 1.9% to 325,325, while beef cows decreased by 4.3% to 226,000.

With the NI dairy herd kept on just 3,133 farms, it means average herd size has increased from 101.4 cows in 2023 to 103.8 cows in 2024. Over the same period, the average suckler herd has declined from 17.1 to 16.8 cows, although more than half of NI farms (13,475) keep beef cows.

LFA

Farms classed as Less Favoured Area (LFA) occupy nearly 70% of the agricultural land in NI. Over 75% of the suckler herd is in the LFA and there are slightly more sucklers than dairy cows in these areas. However, on lowland farms, dairy cows dominate, with 163,798 head compared to 55,577 beef cows.

Land use

Across all of NI, over 77% of land is used for agriculture and 8.8% for forestry.

While there is some limited expansion in the forest area each year, with 502ha planted to the end of March 2025, the area dedicated to organic farming continues to decline.

The latest figures show just 7,000ha of land in NI is under organic management, the lowest reported in NI since 2004.