Land, prices beat inflation but 1.5 million hectares remain uncultivated
Crea report: for the first time in 20 years, average price growth, albeit modest, exceeds the cost of living. Biogas and agri-voltaic driven sales rise by 4%
Key points
The interest of investment funds and the new green energy business (biogas and agri-voltaic) are pushing up farmland prices in Italy, which for the first time in twenty years are beating inflation, with a trend reversal set to be confirmed. These are, in a nutshell, the main news emerging from the CRE 2025 Report on Land Market Trends, now in its 75th edition and a unique reference point for investigating trends in agricultural land prices, measured in absolute 'naked' values, i.e. without taking into account the added value given by overlying crops.
After twenty years better than inflation
Last year, the increase in the price of land exceeded national inflation by about 0.2 per cent and was therefore around one per cent: a figure that may seem modest, but is instead significant in the quotations of what has historically been a safe haven asset not subject to sudden fluctuations; also because it is the result of an average between areas with very different quotations and trends.
The average value is 22,400 euro per hectare: it ranges from 47,100 euro paid in the North-East, to around 35,200 euro in the North-West - where the greatest increase in prices is recorded (+2.3%) - to decidedly lower values in the Centre-South and the Islands, below 16 thousand euro and 9 thousand euro respectively. The number of purchases and sales also increased by 4%, with peaks of 9% in the regions of the Centre.
Top Vineyards and Apple Orchards
The 'bare' figures, then, conceal enormous differences between the various areas of the country, where next to a pasture or a forest of little value, a hectare hosting DOC vineyards can reach values in the millions. The peak is in the Langhe with 2.3 million per hectare for Barolo vineyards. But apple orchards in the Trentino region of Val Venosta also cost between 450 thousand and 750 thousand euro per hectare; quotations of 500 thousand euro also in the Albenga plain for land used for horticulture.
More generally, the difference in value is due not only to the greater presence in the North of land in flat and irrigated areas, but also to the higher rate of urbanisation and the related consumption of agricultural land, which reduces the supply of land, often insufficient to meet demand. On the contrary, in inland and mountainous areas the supply of land by elderly farmers and farms in economic difficulties prevails, which is often not matched by the market. A key issue remains the difficulty of access to land, especially for young farmers, with increasing recourse to rents. There is then the chapter of uncultivated land, one and a half million hectares, with Italian farmers being among the oldest in Europe.
