Village Rotary hosts Farm Bureau director

FALLBROOK — Of more than 4,000 counties in the business, San Diego County is the 12th largest agricultural producing county in the United States, stated Eric Larson, executive director of the San Diego County Farm Bureau, during a recent meeting of the Fallbrook Village Rotary Club.

The county, he added, is the single largest producer of nursery plants in the US, representing 66 percent of the country’s total agricultural sales. The odd combination is that San Diego is also the seventh largest urban county in the US.

The key features that allow San Diego’s agriculture business to flourish are the weather and the water imported by aqueduct, which began to arrive in the county in the late 1940s at the same time the interstate freeway system was being developed, allowing crops to be moved quickly around the county.

There are more than 5,000 agricultural farmers in San Diego County.