EU Agricultural Outlook 2025-35: EU agriculture navigates challenges while embracing opportunities

The Commission has released its latest EU Agricultural Outlook report, which presents the projections for EU agricultural markets until 2035. The report depicts a continued productivity growth, albeit at a slower rate amidst challenges from climate change and availability and affordability of inputs, while EU agriculture transforms towards more sustainable production systems. Structural changes in the EU farming sector are expected to continue shaping the economic and environmental performance of the sector.

The outlook provides insights for stakeholders in the EU agri-food chain, serving as a baseline for designing policy responses to emerging challenges and opportunities, towards an attractive, competitive, resilient and sustainable agricultural sector. To address ongoing challenges, the Commission has proposed a simpler, more targeted, and forward-looking Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) for the post-2027 period.

Based on the report, EU agriculture is expected to maintain a high level of productivity until 2035 to support positive trade performance, particularly for high-value commodities. The EU agri-food exports remain an important contributor to the global food security. EU protein consumption is anticipated to stay slightly above current levels, reflecting increasing protein needs of an ageing EU population. Labour productivity remains the main driver of overall EU agricultural productivity, contributing to an increase in real income per agricultural worker. EU farms are expected to further reduce both greenhouse gas emissions and nitrogen surpluses, indicating a gradual improvement in the sector's environmental performance.

Zooming into sectors, olive oil production is expected to recover from lows observed during last years, while table olive production declines, and tomato markets continue to diversify with growth in processing and snacking categories despite weaker demand for fresh tomatoes in some regions. Similarly, processed orange demand may rise slightly even though fresh orange consumption and production fall, illustrating how evolving consumer habits are reshaping commodity-specific trajectories across the EU.

Beef, pigmeat, and sheep and goat production are projected to continue their gradual decline, driven by shrinking herds, and changing consumer preferences, while production of wine is set to decrease as well, reflecting changing consumer habits.

At the same time, a number of product groups are set for modest but steady growth. Poultry and egg production are both expected to increase, supported by strong consumer demand, while the expansion of oilseed and pulse areas contributes to rising production levels in these crops. Dairy output remains relatively stable overall, but increases in milk solids, butter, and skimmed milk powder signal positive movement within higher-value segments.

Besides detailed information on individual sectors, the report presents several cross-cutting themes such as self-sufficiency, competitiveness and food security, both at the EU and global level. In a nutshell, the EU remains self-sufficient in essential crops, meat and dairy products, while the EU trade performance faces competition challenges. Regarding EU food security, the report depicts changes in EU trade flow concentrations, declining household spending on food, shifts in protein sources, and an increase in caloric intake among others.

This EU Agricultural Outlook report includes, for the very first time, an assessment of the economic and environmental implications of the market outlook for different farm types, The report also provides an assessment of uncertainties, depicting how volatility in oil prices, GDP, inflation, and exchange rates could impact production, prices, consumption and trade performance.

The Commission publishes its outlook report at the end of every year, presenting a set of projections for the main EU agricultural sectors, with the launch of the report taking place during the EU Agri-Food Days. The outlook for agricultural markets relies on market intelligence available until end of October 2025 for agricultural production and trade, and is based on a set of macroeconomic assumptions deemed the most plausible at the time of the analysis. The medium-term market projections provide insights for all stakeholders in the EU agri-food chain, serving as a baseline for designing policy responses to emerging challenges and opportunities, towards an attractive, competitive, resilient and sustainable agricultural sector.

The projections reflect the current CAP, as well as policy actions and free trade agreements in place or ratified until the end of September 2025. This report serves as a baseline for future analytical work by the Commission, but it should not be interpreted as a forecast, due to the inevitable uncertainties surrounding the multitude of factors driving agri-food markets, including macroeconomic developments, geopolitical and trade relations, and climate change impacts. This Commission report is a joint effort between the Directorate-General for Agriculture and Rural Development (DG AGRI) and the Joint Research Centre (JRC).