Processes of change in structures of Polish agriculture in terms of accession to the European Union

Change in the socio-economic system and then the accession of Poland to the European Union as well as globalization changed the Polish agriculture demonstrating, at the same time, a number of its weaknesses. Transformations taking place in agriculture are significant not only in economic but also in social terms, especially in the context of ensuring food safety as well as performing functions of a non-market nature by the segment of the economy. The premise for substantiating the need to analyze changes in agriculture is also large support for this sector from public funds. For this reason, the possibilities to make development processes in agriculture more dynamic are of particular significance. In the paper results of a statistical-descriptive analysis of the process of structural transformations in agriculture in the first decade of the 21st century as well as factors determining the pace and directions of changes taking place are presented. The reasoning was based on selected indicators describing changes in basic agricultural structures which determine the economic potential and competitive capacities of agricultural farms to the main extent. Due to the significant regional diversity of the Polish agriculture, changes in the structures of the agricultural sector were also analyzed from this perspective. The paper refers to individual agriculture, constituting the dominant segment of the agricultural sector in Poland. It was based on data from common statistics as well as results of representative field studies conducted periodically by the Institute of Agricultural and Food Economics - National Research Institute (IERiGŻ-PIB) on a sample of approx. 0.2% of the actual number of individual farms.