Bella Vista

Steve Fisher, REALTOR®
Crye-Leike, Realtors
Phone: 479-876-6800

Bentonville

Al & Mavis Hvidsten, CRS, GRI
Harris McHaney Realtors
Phone: 479-273-3838

Bryant

Lori Adcock, CRA, CPM, Realtor®
Crye-Leike, Realtors
Phone: 501-315-0378

Eureka Springs

Kyle Box, REALTOR®/Co-Owner
Real Living All Seasons Real Estate, LLC
Phone: 479-253-0303

Hardy

Rhonda L. Michel, Realtor-Associate Broker
Coldwell Banker Ozark Real Estate
Phone: 870-856-3206

Horseshoe Bend

Dwight Lufkin
That's Me Realty
Phone: 870-670-5388

Jonesboro

Jill Crews, Buyer Specialist
RE/MAX Real Estate Centre
Phone: 870-974-7355

Lakeview

Mike Goar, Realtor®
Beaman Realty
Phone: 800-467-5253

Russellville

Gregg Ricono, REALTOR®
Coldwell Banker James R. Ford & Associates
Phone: 479-968-5211

Van Buren

Vicki Sheets
Gold Key Realty
Phone: 501-636-2200

Although its agriculture is becoming more and more diversified, Arkansas remains one of the leading cotton-producing states. Cotton was introduced into Arkansas about 1800, and was first grown by homesteaders. Later, when steamboat transportation opened up the fertile bottomlands, landowners arrived from other cotton-growing states to cultivate large plantations with slave labor.

Rice was first introduced to the state in 1904. By the mid-1970s, Arkansas ranked as the nation’s leading rice-producing state, a rank it still holds. The state produces two-fifths of all the rice grown in the United States. Other important crops are wheat, sorghum grain, and hay (including lespedeza, alfalfa, clover, and wild hay) and similar plants used for livestock feed. Tomatoes, peaches, apples, grapes, strawberries, pecans, snap beans, sweet potatoes, watermelons, and spinach are also grown. Crops of winter wheat are increasingly grown in the Mississippi Plain.

Arkansas ranks first among the states in production of broilers and is also a leading producer of turkeys and eggs. Poultry and poultry products generate over two-fifths of all farm income. Poultry farms are found throughout western Arkansas on marginal land in the highlands. Cattle raising and dairying, conducted mainly in the northwestern and northern sections of the state and in the lower Arkansas River valley, have become important in Arkansas since the 1920s. The quality of cattle has been greatly improved, and ranchers have shown great interest in the Santa Gertrudis, a sturdy breed developed in Texas and well suited to Arkansas’s hot summers.

The forests of the Mississippi Alluvial Plain contain considerable oak forests along with cypress, water tupelo, black and sweet gum. South of the Arkansas River in the Ouachitas and the Gulf Coastal Plain, the vast coniferous forests of loblolly and shortleaf pine supply saw mills. In the Ozarks, oak and hickory forests once formed the basis of a thriving woodworking industry. While the oak and hickory forests remain, the woodworking industry has diminished.

Two mineral fuels—petroleum and natural gas—account for much of the state’s income from mining. Beds of high quality bituminous and semianthracite coal underlie about 4,100 sq km (about 1,600 sq mi) of the Arkansas River valley in the western part of the state. There are also vast deposits of lignite in central and southwest Arkansas whose uses were explored in the 1980s. Natural gas occurs in the upper western Arkansas River valley, and it also flows in great quantities from oil wells in southwestern Arkansas. There, however, since the gas is of a type that needs to be processed before burning, most of it is converted into gasoline or other valuable by-products and is not used as a fuel itself.

Arkansas leads the nation in the production of bromine, used in gasoline antiknock mixtures and other chemicals. The state also has important deposits of building stone. Most of the good building stone is found in the Ozark Mountains. Also mined in Arkansas are significant quantities of limestone, barite, and silica. Bauxite deposits, which are concentrated in central Arkansas, are no longer mined commercially.

Wood processing and furniture making are important in central and western Arkansas, notably at Pine Bluff and Fort Smith, and also in many Ozark towns, such as Rogers in the northwest. Paper products are made at Camden, Pine Bluff, Crossett, Ashdown, and other centers in the southern pine belt. El Dorado, also in the south, is a center of oil refineries and chemical plants.

Rice processing, cotton ginning, and the manufacture of cottonseed oil are old, established industries at Stuttgart, Jonesboro, and other cities and towns of the northeast and east. Many food processing plants have been built to accommodate the poultry production. These plants are located in the small- to medium-sized towns in the Ozarks, along the Arkansas River valley, and in western Arkansas. However, many new plants, making such items as electronics equipment, air conditioners, shoes, and light metal goods, have been established in the state.

The federal government has developed hydroelectric power in the Arkansas, White, and Ouachita river basins. The largest and most famous of the dams is Bull Shoals on the White River. Additional dams, built as part of the Arkansas River Navigation Project, provide for improved flood control as well as expanded power production. The first nuclear power plant in the region was established at Russellville. Conventional steam-powered plants fueled by coal generate 62 percent of the electricity produced in the state, nuclear power plants provide another 27 percent, and the remainder comes from hydroelectric facilities.

The tourist industry is one of Arkansas’s most important sources of income. More than 2 million people are attracted to national parks in Arkansas, while nearly 8 million people use the many state parks.

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