Evaluation of the plot size (farm land) of family agricultural holdings and the needs for land consolidation in Poland

The current study presents status and the need for improvement of the land distribution of family agricultural holdings in Poland. The assessment of the distribution of farm lands in the area between 1 and 300 ha has been made according to the 2013 data and provided by the Polish Agency for Restructuring and Modernisation of Agriculture (ARMA). Our analysis included totally app. 750,000 of family agricultural holdings. The evaluation of land consolidation was based on the two regional criteria proposed by the Regional Offices of Geodesy and Agricultural Areas, i.e. the plot size and the number of plots within individual family farms. The family agricultural holdings, that are included to the Polish system of agricultural support, have an average land area of around 16.0 ha, and this refers to around 6 cadastral plots with an average acreage of app. 3.0 ha. The need of land consolidation was estimated to be at the level of app. 7.1 million ha (this corresponds to 69.14% of total agricultural area land in Poland). The problem occurs in the entire country, but the worst situation is in the southern, south-eastern and central Poland. The implementation of the land consolidation and farmland exchange procedures within the Programme RDP (Rural Development Programme) in the period 2007-2013 stood at the level of 13,600 ha annually, thus the area of unfavourable land distribution was not reduced significantly. According to our evaluations the land consolidation should involve at least 50,000 ha annually to improve in real terms the distribution of agricultural plots in Poland.