WASHINGTON – Fiscal Year 2014 agricultural exports will total $149.5 billion, an estimated $6.9 billion higher than previous estimates, the US Department of Agriculture projects. If realized, this will mark a new record for American agricultural exports.

Such record growth would not be attributable solely to price increases, which have driven export numbers in the past, but also to an increase in US agricultural exports volume, which is projected to increase by 31 percent between Fiscal Years 2013 and 2014.


Agricultural exports last fiscal year totaled $140.9 billion and supported nearly one million jobs in the US. Fiscal Years 2009 to 2013 represent the strongest five years in history for agricultural trade, with US agricultural product exports totaling $619 billion over those five years, said Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack.

"USDA will continue to focus its efforts on tapping into new markets for what is grown and made in rural America. Today, only 1 percent of US companies export, and yet 95 percent of the world's consumers live outside the borders of the United States, creating significant opportunities for US food and agriculture,” Vilsack added.