Farm figure blunder

25 January 2002




Farm figure blunder

GOVERNMENT figures for the number of people working in farming have been revised after it emerged officials left out over 44,000 people from their calculations.

Final UK June 2001 Census figures released on Jan 16 suggested the industry had shed more than 50,000 people over a 12 month period.

But a corrected table released by DEFRA on Fri, Jan 18 revealed the drop in the UK labour force was far lower.

As has been the case for many years, the biggest drop was seen in the farm worker category which saw a fall of 9200 people.

The number of part-time farmers increased by nearly 3000 while the number of farmers who left the industry altogether was 3200. &#42


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