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FRESNO — If diesel fuel prices don’t drop significantly in the next few weeks, small-scale California farmers say they will sink deeper into debt and consumers will feel the sting of rising food prices. 

The state’s diesel prices spiked in early September at about $2.05 a gallon – roughly 70 cents higher than last year’s price and almost a dollar over 1999’s national average. 

Since then, California’s average price has dropped to about $1.90. But for farmers who regularly spend up to 20 percent of their production costs on energy, the price dip might be too little, too late. 

“It’s affecting our bottom line and consumer prices and it’s gonna kill the economy,” said Keith Nilmeier, owner of Nilmeier Farms in Fresno County, the heart of the state’s $30 billion a year agricultural economy. 

The rising fuel costs could cut deeply into farmers’ profits while simultaneously driving food prices up, many farmers believe. 

Most growers negotiated contracts months before harvest and will have to swallow the extra cost. But food prices still may increase as truckers, processors, packers and distributors begin hiking their fees to account for the fuel prices, said Nilmeier, who farms 500 acres of peaches, grapes and other fruit and runs a fleet of about 20 trucks. 

The spike in diesel prices has coincided this year with rising gasoline and natural gas prices at a time when California’s increasingly high electricity consumption has prompted regulators to warn of shortages and brownouts. 

Farmers use diesel fuel to run planting and harvesting equipment and trucks that transport crops to consumers. Natural gas and electricity is used to manufacture fertilizer and process a wide variety of crops. Electricity runs machinery to cool livestock and pumps to irrigate farmland. 

This year’s spike in energy prices means farmers’ direct fuel costs will rise 40 percent, or $2.2 billion, and will make up the largest percentage of overall farm expenses since 1986, according the U.S. Department of Agriculture. 

The high diesel and gasoline prices are attributed to a world oil supply that’s failing to meet demand, while natural gas production in Canada and the United States also has lagged, said Susanne Garfield, a spokeswoman for the California Energy Commission. 

Natural gas prices, which peaked in August at $7 per million British thermal units, are now hovering around $4.83 per million Btu. For years, the price didn’t rise much above $3 per million Btu, Garfield said. 

“It’s gone on and on with no end in sight. With increases in petroleum prices in general, we’re not confident that this will get straightened out any time soon,” said Mark Lyftog, controller for Harris Farms, a 15,000-acre tomato and almond operation near Coalinga. 

“It would take quite a withdrawal in price for world oil prices to get back in line,” Lyftog said. 

Lyftog expects to pay roughly $300,000 this year in additional fuel costs associated with the recent price spikes.