Metropolitan Fresno, officially Fresno–Madera, CA CSA, is a metropolitan area in the San Joaquin Valley, in the United States, consisting of Fresno and Madera counties. It is the third-largest metropolitan region in Northern California, behind the San Francisco Bay Area and Greater Sacramento. It is also the 49th-largest CSA in the U.S. as of 2010 census.Metropolitan Fresno is anchored by Fresno, the fifth-largest city in California and the 35th-largest in the United States. The metropolitan area is located in the Central Valley, which is one of the world's most productive agricultural regions. It has a large agricultural economy despite being increasingly urbanized. In more recent years, statewide droughts in California have further strained both the Fresno metropolitan area's and the entire Central Valley's water security.