Apples top 2015 crop production in Washington

With today's Fruit Grower Report, I'm Bob Larson. Growers in the state of Washington set a record of $10.7 billion dollars in Ag production for 2015 ... with apples topping the list for the 11th year in a row ...

CHRIS MERTZ ... "For the last two years, the top five commodities remained the same. It was apples, then milk, cow and calves, potatoes, and coming in at number five was wheat."

Chris Mertz, Northwest Regional Director at the USDA's National Ag Statistics Service says apple growers enjoyed a particularly good year ...

CHRIS MERTZ ... "For the 2015 crop year, the value of apples increased 27 percent from 2014, a large number of $2-point-4-Billion dollars worth in 2015.

Mertz says the biggest factor in the huge jump for apples was felt at the cash register ...

CHRIS MERTZ ... "The largest impact for the increased value of apple production was the price-per-pound. The USDA's average price-per-pound in 2014 was 28-point-6-cents-per-pound, where in 2015 it increased to 40-and-a-half-cents-per-pound. So that large increase had a big impact on the total value of production in the state of Washington."

Mertz says apples made up about 22 percent of the state's entire ag value in 2015, up from 19 percent the year before.

Rounding out the top ten crops in order are all hay in sixth, cherries at seven, eggs in the number eight spot, followed by grapes at nine and hops at number ten.