Thread: AGRICULTURE: San Diego reports largest crop value ever

AGRICULTURE: San Diego reports largest crop value ever, but challenges remain

By PAT MAIO pmaio@nctimes.com
August 24, 2011 11:47 am

San Diego County's agriculture industry reported its largest-ever crop value in 2010, even while challenges going forward hinge on a limp economy, rising water costs and pests ----including its newest threat, the palm weevil.

The county's total agriculture crop value rose to $1.65 billion in 2010, the highest ever reported, according to an annual survey released Wednesday by the county.

Overall, in measuring all crops in the county, the total agricultural product value last year rose 7 percent from 2009's $1.548 billion. The county had a crop value of $1.552 billion in 2008, according to the county Department of Agriculture, Weights& Measures.

Although the value increased, the acreage devoted to commercial agriculture fell a modest 1.5 percent, or 4,578 acres.

Ornamental trees and shrubs, which took over as the No. 1 crop in San Diego County in 2009 with a total production value of $365.2 million, rose nearly 14.7 percent to $418.8 million in 2010. This is the second consecutive year that ornamental trees and shrubs grabbed the top spot.

Indoor flowering and foliage plants had a crop value of $292.5 million, up slightly from $290.8 million seen the previous year.

Avocados remained the No. 1 fruit crop in 2010 and increased in value nearly 13 percent to $147 million despite water restrictions and a 22 percent drop in acreage, according to Lisa Leondis, director of the San Diego County Department of Agriculture, Weights and Measures.

Bill Horn, chairman of the county's Board of Supervisors, worried that rising water costs could hurt the avocado business going forward, as well as competition.

"The more straws you put in the water, the less we get, and we are at the end of the pipeline," said Horn, who lives in Valley Center and grows avocados and citrus.

Tomato crop values totaled $86.7 million in 2010, but projections for 2011 are uncertain since a major grower, Oceanside's Harry Singh & Sons, announced earlier this year that it would not grow tomatoes, citing tough economic times and competition.

Harry Singh & Sons, which was one of the largest suppliers of vine-ripened tomatoes in the United States and a fixture in North San Diego County for more than 70 years, has indicated that it might resume its business in 2012.

While the county is reporting its biggest-ever crop value, Leondis used a news conference held Wednesday at the Mission Hills Nursery in San Diego as a forum to renew concerns about pests posing possible problems to future crops.

She is working aggressively to prevent federal and state agriculture regulators from imposing a quarantine countywide on the sale of palm trees because of the discovery of palm weevils near the U.S.-Mexico border.

Weevils, which burrow into the trunk of the palm and drain the tree of nutrients, also were found in Orange County's Laguna Beach last October. More bugs were spotted in May in San Ysidro, just north of the border.

"Keeping our county pest-free is very important," said Leondis.

The weevils pose a threat to the $21 million palm-tree industry in San Diego County, and more broadly, the $70 million industry in the state, Leondis added. There's an additional $30 million in date palms, mostly found in the Coachella Valley near Thermal.

The ornamental palms sold by nurseries are used in landscaping.

Jim Wilkens, owner of Wilkens Palm Tree Nursery in Escondido, is keeping his fingers crossed that a quarantine isn't declared countywide, as his tiny palm tree business, situated on 7 acres, could feel the financial pinch.

County agricultural inspectors visited his nursery Wednesday and gave his trees a clean bill of health, he said.

"Business is down here because building is down," Wilkens said. "It's very unstable right now."

Leondis wants to roll out a program in the next month or so that would have up to 300 traps set up throughout the county to try to detect the weevils. Roughly two to five traps per square mile would be set up strategically at palm tree nurseries and golf courses countywide to avert a quarantine, she said.

"I hope there are no weevils in North County," she said. "We are asking growers to support our trapping because we can prevent a quarantine if we can prove the weevils don't exist."

Call staff writer Pat Maio at 760-740-3527.

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