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Drought Hurts Fresno County Crop Value, Dropping Behind Tulare County

Joe Moore
/
Valley Public Radio

A report released today shows that Fresno's agricultural industry has slipped out of its first-place standing in the state.  The 2013 Fresno County crop report shows that its total gross value of agricultural products last year was $6.4 billion, over $1.3 billion behind Tulare County--the first time since 2002 that Tulare swung to the top of the list.

The 2013 report also marks two other records:  for the first time, almonds topped grapes as Fresno County's #1 crop, finally giving the county its second billion-dollar crop industry.  Overall, the county is still 2.3 percent behind where it was in 2012 and 6.5 percent behind 2011's record year, owing to water shortages and ongoing drought conditions.

Kern County's crop report is due in the next few weeks.

Kerry Klein is an award-winning reporter whose coverage of public health, air pollution, drinking water access and wildfires in the San Joaquin Valley has been featured on NPR, KQED, Science Friday and Kaiser Health News. Her work has earned numerous regional Edward R. Murrow and Golden Mike Awards and has been recognized by the Association of Health Care Journalists and Society of Environmental Journalists. Her podcast Escape From Mammoth Pool was named a podcast “listeners couldn’t get enough of in 2021” by the radio aggregator NPR One.
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