Line
Crop Yields and Farmland
U.S. corn and wheat yields and the share of land used for farming, indexed to 1961 = 100
Plays the chart through its history. Pauses are where the data set a record or moved most.
Yields: USDA NASS, bushels per acre harvested. Farmland: FAO via the World Bank, cropland plus permanent pasture as a share of land area. Each line starts at 100 in 1961, so the chart compares growth, not levels.
Whether more food comes from more land or from more out of each acre. Yields of the two biggest U.S. grain crops have multiplied since 1961, while the share of land used for farming, in the U.S. and worldwide, has moved far less.
What this chart reads
- U.S. Corn for Grain Yield (Bushels per Acre)as “U.S. corn yield”latest 2026-12-31
- U.S. Wheat Yield (Bushels per Acre)as “U.S. wheat yield”latest 2026-12-31
- World · Agricultural Land · % of land areaas “World farmland share”behind
- United States · Agricultural Land · % of land areaas “U.S. farmland share”latest 2024-12-31
Sources
U.S. Corn for Grain Yield (Bushels per Acre). Source: USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS), Quick Stats, survey data, national level, annual, "CORN, GRAIN - YIELD, MEASURED IN BU / ACRE". Read from the public Quick Stats bulk crops file. NASS data are works of the U.S. government and in the public domain. Years are dated December 31.
U.S. Wheat Yield (Bushels per Acre). Source: USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service (NASS), Quick Stats, survey data, national level, annual, "WHEAT - YIELD, MEASURED IN BU / ACRE". Read from the public Quick Stats bulk crops file. NASS data are works of the U.S. government and in the public domain. Years are dated December 31.
World · Agricultural Land · % of land area. Source: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAOSTAT), via World Bank World Development Indicators, indicator AG.LND.AGRI.ZS. Licence per the World Bank's indicator metadata: CC BY 4.0. Palanor reads it each month and rewrites the history, so revisions carry through.
United States · Agricultural Land · % of land area. Source: Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAOSTAT), via World Bank World Development Indicators, indicator AG.LND.AGRI.ZS. Licence per the World Bank's indicator metadata: CC BY 4.0. Palanor reads it each month and rewrites the history, so revisions carry through.
Charts are drawn from Palanor's signal library and recomputed from source data on every view. Transformations (changes, indexing, year-on-year rates) are Palanor's.