THE MEASURE OF CALIFORNIA AGRICULTURE, 2005José E. Bervejillo, Henrich Brunke, Marcia Kreith, Kurt Richter, Omid Rowhani, and Daniel A. Sumner

University of California – Agricultural Issues Center

California Land

• California total land amounts 99.8 million acres. The state’s 79.6 thousand farms occupy 27.6 percent of that total.

• Approximately 46% of the state’s land corresponds to federal land, and the rest is non-federal land, rural and developed, and water surface.

• The 2002 Census of Agriculture reports 27.6 million acres of agricultural land in California, 51 percent of which are pastures and rangelands. Harvested cropland occupies 31 percent, while pastured cropland and other cropland together account for 9 percent.

• During the past 4 decades the area of cropland allocated to orchards and vineyards, vegetables and melons, has consistently increased.

Agriculture is important to the California economy

• The value added of all local industries combined equals the Gross State Product (GSP), which was $1,446 billion in 2003.

• Value added results from substracting costs inputs and services purchased from outside the geographic region or industry from total sales.

• Value added of agriculture (farming, agricultural support services and food industry) has increased signifi cantly in the last 25 years, but the rate of growth of the state economy has been even faster.

• Consequently, the share of agriculture in the GSP has decreased.

Farmland Conversion

• Between 1988 and 2002, about 734 thousand acres of land have been converted into urban and built-up uses. This quantity is equivalent to 2.4 percent of the total agricultural land available in the state in 1987 (30.6 million acres).

• Of the total acres converted from 2000 to 2002, 59,144 acres were formerly cropland and 35,126 were grazing land.

Farm Sales and Distribution

• Total farm sales in 2003 were $27.8 billion.

• A large number of farms accounts for a small portion of state agricultural sales and a small number of farms contribute with large sales.

• Most farms in the state contribute very little to total agricultural ouput.

• Only 10% of the fi rms, each with more than half a million dollars in sales, account for 86% of total sales.

California Sacramento S. Joaquin Central Central Valley

Valley Valley Valley* as % of CaliforniaFarms with Hired Workers 34,342 4,098 14,135 18,233 53%Total Hired Workers 535,256 49,811 243,079 292,890 55%Workers Hired 150 days or more 201,852 16,548 77,683 94,231 47%Workers Hired less than 150 days 333,404 33,263 165,396 198,659 60%Payroll ($1,000) 4,317,078 343,692 1,679,350 2,023,042 47%

(*) Central Valley = Sacramento and San Joaquin together

Source: USDA/NASS, Census of Agriculture, 2002

Farm Workers by Region, California 2002

The multiplier effect of California’s agriculture

• For every $1 billion increase in the value added of California farms, the overall Gross State Product (GSP) increases by $1.93 billion

• For every $1 billion increase in the output of California farms, the number of jobs in the farming sector increases by 10,872 and the overall state employment increases by 17,875 jobs.

• If we consider farms together with closely related sectors, such as harvesting services, contract labor, packing and cooling, cotton ginning, fertilizers and pesticides industry, and food industry, a $1 billion increase in the value added of this group of activities results in a $ 2.28 billion increase in the GSP.

• Considering the multiplier effects, farms and closely related industries account for 6.4 percent of GSP.