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EPA's National Pesticides Web Site

The Pacific Southwest supports the most productive agricultural economy in the United States. California alone is home to a $30 billion agricultural industry; its San Joaquin Valley is the single richest agricultural region in the world. California employs 27 percent of the nation's farm workers, operates a third of nation's largest dairies, and produces 64 percent of the nation's vegetables and melons. California is the nation’s sole producer of a dozen crops and the leading producer of five dozen more.

Arizona, Hawaii, and Nevada are also rich in agriculture. Arizona, despite its desert climate, ranks second nationally in production of ten commodities, and in the top ten for eleven more. Hawaii, with its year-round growing season and isolation, supports a variety of agricultural products. Long known for sugarcane and pineapple, the state’s farm economy is in transition to a much more diversified product mix with many smaller operations, and now leads the nation in sales of several tropical commodities. Hawaii is also an ideal location for developing new seed crops, including some that are genetically modified to resist certain pests and pesticides. Nevada, with rangelands over 82% of its area, has a productive agricultural sector dominated by beef and hay production. While plentiful and diverse foods provide the raw materials of a healthy diet, such intensive agricultural production over such vast areas affects the region’s environment and, in turn, its people’s health.

National Agricultural Workers Survey (NAWS)

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