Record Sales

Record Sales. I’m Greg Martin with today’s Fruit Grower Report.

The Washington State Department of Agriculture and the Washington Department of Commerce have issued a joint statement reporting a record sales amount of $241.3 million dollars for fiscal year 2011 from state export assistance. Jason Kelly, Communications Director for the WSDA.

KELLY: More great news for Washington State agriculture, that;s the bottom line. Our growers are feeding the world and here at WSDA our job is to help them do that. Working with our friends over at the Department of Commerce, our trade specialists here at WSDA are helping our small and medium sized businesses take advantage of that growing demand for Washington fruit and agriculture products in foreign markets.

This year the Department of Commerce reported non-ag exports as seeing a major increase but Kelly says ag is holding its own.

KELLY: The dramatic growth in ag exports that we assisted last year held firm. That’s kind of in line with what we have been seeing with the overall trend. Currently food and agricultural exports from Washington State are at record pace. I think we’re scheduled to break the $8-billion dollar mark in agricultural exports this year.

That is great news and a number of businesses are taking advantage.

KELLY: Some of the larger agricultural exporters like Stemilt, they’re old hands at the international game. They are already in exports markets. They’ve got good international sales teams and they’re exploiting our natural advantages here on the Pacific seaboard.

That’s today’s Fruit Grower Report. I’m Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network.