Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, how many people were employed in the agricultural sector in each year since 1995.

The number of people working on farms in England and in the United Kingdom from 1995 to 2014 is set out in the table below.

Figures pre-2000 cover all farms, whereas figures from 2000 onwards relate to commercial holdings only, so are not directly comparable. Commercial farms are defined as those with significant levels of farming activity and have any of the following:

· More than 5ha farmed area

· More than 1ha permanent nursery/fruit crops

· More than 0.5ha outdoor crops

· More than 0.1ha glasshouses

· Any area used to grow mushrooms

· More than 10 cattle, 50 pigs, 20 sheep, 20 goats or 1,000 poultry

The principal effect of this change was to reduce the number of part-time farmers who had very small levels of farming activity.