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Note: These figures are for the County’s agricultural industry in 2009, and do not reflect the effects of the freezes that occurred in early 2010.)
While some sections of the economy are still on shaky ground, agriculture continues to remain strong in Hillsborough County. The Hillsborough County Agriculture Industry Development Program and the County's Cooperative Extension Service have released the agriculture sales and acreage estimates for 2009.
According to the data, the 2009 sales estimate of Hillsborough County agriculture products is almost $778 million, down 3.1 percent from 2008, with 243,388 acres devoted to agriculture. Despite the fact that the amount of farmland has decreased 8.3 percent since 1997, the production value of the land is up 57 percent because of the increased farming of higher-value-per-acre commodities.
Hillsborough County covers more than 1,000 square miles and 38 percent of that is used for agricultural production.
Hillsborough ranks as the 4th largest producer of agricultural products in the state, and 59th out of 3,076 counties in the United States. Hillsborough County has 2,843 farms, the second most of any county in Florida.
Hillsborough County produces the most tropical fish and strawberries of all counties in the state. Strawberries continue to be the highest sales crop at $338,045,400, which is 43.5 percent of the County's total agricultural sales. Hillsborough produces 90 percent of the strawberries grown in Florida, and nearly 11 percent of the strawberries grown in the nation; 14 percent of Florida's tomatoes and 5 percent of the tomatoes grown in the U.S.; 85 percent of the state's tropical fish.
The next highest sales crops after strawberries are:
- Ornamental plants at second with $144,554,342, accounting for 18.6 percent of annual sales.
- Vegetable production at third at $138,000,000, with 17.7 percent of annual sales.
- Aquaculture at fourth with $28,518,750 and 3.7 percent of annual sales.
- Citrus at fifth with $21,583,789 accounting for 2.8 percent of annual sales.
These five commodities together generate 86 percent of the agricultural sales in the County, using only 16 percent of the total land area devoted to agriculture.
According to a 2005 study completed on behalf of the Hillsborough County Agriculture Industry Development program, agriculture production and its related businesses in Hillsborough County generate an economic impact of more than $1.4 billion and employ more than 20,100 people with $293 million in annual earnings.
Local agriculture generates additional local economic impact by supporting related businesses such as banking, real estate, transportation, packaging, equipment, seed, agricultural suppliers and services, and marketing firms.
For more information, contact Stephen Gran, Hillsborough County Agriculture Industry Development Program at (813) 272-5506.
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