Producers throughout Europe are subject to many of the same economic forces that drive North American farmers. But with their land constraints, Europeans are forced to farm intensively to take full advantage of everything the land can yield.

The average farm in the EU 27 countries is a little more than is 12.6 hectares (approx. 31 acres). In Germany, farms average 46 hectares (about 115 acres). In the U.S., the average farm is 419 acres.

In total land area, at 138,000 square miles, Germany is slightly smaller than Montana, the fourth largest state in landmass, which is 147,000 square miles.

Germany has 17 million hectares (42 million acres) of land dedicated to agricultural production. About 70% is arable (11.9 million hectares or 29.4 million acres) and used to produce a wide variety of row crops. The remaining 30% (5.1 million hectares or 12.6 million acres) used as pastureland producing perennial grasses.

Germany is the EU’s largest producer of dairy products and has slightly more than 4 million cows. Overall, the EU 27 countries have 24.2 million dairy cows.

The top four dairy states — California, Wisconsin, New York and Idaho — combined have 4.2 million milk cows. In total area, these four states cover about 367,000 square miles.