Employment in industries that process and market agricultural products declined 9 percent between 1975 and 1988 (the 13 years for which data are available). Total employment generated by agricultural processing and marketing firms in 1988 was over 3.2 million, or about 2.5 percent of all U.S. employment. Industries involved range from grain elevators to bakeries, poultry processors, soft drink bottlers, and apparel and textile manufacturers. The largest sector is apparel and textiles, which employs over twofifths of the workers in food and fiber processing and marketing. It was also the sector which lost the largest number of jobs.