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Livestock operations. By species Catalonia
2016 2013 2009 2007 2005 2003 1999 1997 1995
Operations (1) 11,927 12,078 13,473 14,805 15,810 15,282 18,286 20,454 22,482
Bovine 4,029 4,106 4,523 4,341 4,814 5,084 5,928 6,682 7,501
Ovine 2,243 2,158 2,085 2,111 2,234 2,445 2,811 2,925 3,153
Caprine 1,303 1,194 1,416 1,335 1,430 1,419 1,814 1,957 2,250
Swine 4,288 4,321 4,983 5,129 5,908 6,426 7,914 8,786 10,554
Equine 1,999 1,579 1,762 1,602 1,365 1,362 1,845 1,751 2,073
Poultry 2,691 2,965 3,871 7,178 8,034 7,200 8,335 10,768 12,670
Mother rabbits 1,182 1,152 1,748 3,863 4,259 4,055 4,909 6,952 7,864
Bees 464 399 365 186 255 305 435 306 205
Livestock units (2) 2,591,406 2,683,236 2,738,275 2,606,839 2,622,146 2,637,710 2,787,757 2,218,838 2,111,614
Bovine 344,370 326,258 323,646 288,298 312,975 350,507 388,099 387,535 372,894
Ovine 59,973 57,983 60,008 62,149 68,731 71,071 87,037 91,207 86,040
Caprine 7,278 7,115 7,175 7,418 7,514 7,502 7,216 5,105 4,643
Swine 1,589,644 1,668,588 1,698,124 1,671,989 1,629,503 1,622,594 1,594,240 1,283,477 1,169,618
Equine 16,785 16,113 15,482 12,703 10,607 10,284 11,436 13,181 9,166
Poultry 566,114 600,453 627,140 557,292 586,413 568,217 691,785 433,100 464,086
Mother rabbits 7,241 6,728 6,701 6,990 6,402 7,535 7,945 5,233 5,167
Source: Idescat, based on data from the Survey on Farm Structure of INE.
Notes:
(1) Total operations with livestock units.
(2) Does not include apiculture (bees).
The 1999 data has been adapted to the population researched in the Agricultural Census 2009 in order to assist with comparability.

Last update: February 28, 2018.

Methodological note

Definition of concepts

Livestock operation
The entirety of the animals, equipment or buildings and other assets and rights that are commercialised by their owner for livestock production, primarily for market purposes, which is located on an estate or contiguous group of estates operated by a single owner. Livestock operation that is divided by pathways or other roads open to traffic is still considered as such.
Livestock
Includes animals on the operation, plus transhumant livestock and livestock as part of an integration or contract scheme i.e. that implies dependence on supplies and sales.
Livestock unit (UR)
Unit used to measure the livestock sector that is obtained by applying a coefficient to each species and type in order to be able to express different species in terms of the same equivalent unit.

Methodological aspects

Agricultural statistics are generated within the framework of the EU programme on surveys on farm structure conducted by all EU members in order have up-to-date, comparable information on the member states, with the purpose of being used a basic tool for designing the Common Agricultural Policy. This programme establishes that an Agricultural Census shall be performed every ten years and sample-based surveys in the intervening years. For the cycle that starts with the Agricultural census 2009, two triennial surveys are established.

In these censuses, which are exhaustive, all the existing farms are researched, which from 2009, must comply with certain minimum criteria, while in the Surveys on Farm Structure the population studied complies with some less broad minimum criteria and the data is selected by sampling.

The introduction of these methodological changes with respect to previous editions means that the data is not directly comparable.

What is more, the census questionnaire also includes an additional sheet through which information of interest to the Catalan agricultural sector can be gathered.

Between 1989 and 2007, these statistical operations were conducted by Idescat with the support of the Department of Agriculture, Livestock, Fishing, Food and the Environment.

In 2009, the INE became the responsible body for the Agricultural census for Spain as a whole and in Catalonia it works in collaboration with Idescat and the Department of Agriculture, Livestock, Fishing, Food and the Environment, in accordance with the corresponding collaboration agreements.

The Survey on Farm Structure shows the biennial data series for intercensal periods up to 2007. The series will be triennial from 2013 onwards. From 2013 onwards, the thematic sections will include a section on Rural Development and another on Standard Production, which substitutes the processing of economic data on operations which was based on the gross margin until 2007.

Furthermore, in conjunction with DARP, Idescat has generated a variety of informative documents setting out the main results of the Agricultural Census and the Survey on Farm Structure, prior to 2009. The document devoted to the Agricultural Census contains a compilation of the main variables and compares them with the corresponding previous censuses, pointing out and commenting on the basic factors in their evolution in the intervening period.

The documents devoted to Survey on Farm Structure provide data on the main variables in this survey and compare them with the universe of reference of the corresponding Agricultural Census.

Unavailable information is represented using the symbol ":". When the value is lower than that of the minimum unit to be able to estimate the statistical operation or if it effects statistical confidentiality, the symbol used is "..".