Higher agricultural output per GDP linked to lower per capita gold reserves.
Comparing Agriculture, forestry, and fishing, value added (current US$), per unit of GDP with Total reserves (gold at national valuation) (SDR), per capita across 170 countries, 1990–2025.
- Rank correlation
- -0.76
- Holding size constant
- -0.65
- Countries compared
- 170
- Period
- 1990–2025
What might link these
Countries heavily reliant on agriculture for their GDP, relative to their overall economic size, tend to hold fewer gold reserves per person. This could reflect different economic development strategies or a focus on internal agricultural growth over external asset accumulation.
Why this is not proof of anything
This is a correlation across countries, not an experiment. It cannot show that either indicator causes the other, and both may simply follow a third thing. This correlation could be confounded by a country's overall level of economic development or its historical role in international finance.
The second figure above repeats the measurement with national population and income held constant. It is the more conservative number: a relationship that largely disappears there was mostly telling you that larger, richer countries have more of most things.
How this was measured
Both indicators were ranked across every country reporting each, and the two rankings compared — ranks rather than raw values, because a handful of very large countries can otherwise manufacture a relationship on their own. The calculation is arithmetic over figures already published on this site; the commentary above is drafted from the two indicator names and the resulting coefficients.