Agricultre in East Germany employed 10.8 percent of the labor force, received 7.4 percent of gross capital investments, and contributed 8.1 percent to the country's net product in 1985.^[1] Farms were usuallty organized either in state-owned farms (Volkseigenes Gut) or collective farms (Landwirtschaftliche Produktionsgenossenschaft).

During the 1970s and early 1980s, the trend in East German agriculture was toward larger units; some crop-producing collectives and state farms combined to form cooperatives holding 4,000 to 5,000 hectares. These agribusinesses, known as Cooperative Departments of Crop Production (Kooperative Abteilungen der Pflanzenproduktion--KAP), which included foodprocessing establishments, became the dominant form of agricultural enterprise in crop production. In the early 1980s, specialization also took place in livestock production.^[2]