Occupations in Tirunelveli include service-sector activities such as administration, agricultural trading, tourism, banking, agro-machinery, cement manufacturing, information technology and educational services. In 1991, the Tirunelveli region ranked second in the number of women workers. Service sectors such as tourism have developed, due to a growth in religious tourism. Tirunelveli has beedi and cement factories, tobacco companies, workshops for steel-based products and mills for cotton textiles, spinning and weaving; there are also small-scale industries, such as tanneries and brick kilns. The agricultural areas, hand-woven clothes and household industries contribute to the economic growth of the city. Food-processing industries have developed since the late 1990s; at the district level, it is the foremost industria l segment. Industries involving rice-making, blue-jelly metal manufacturing and jem power generating are located on the outskirts of the city. The major agricultural produces in the region are paddy and cotton. Beedi production during the 1990s earned an annual revenue of 190 billion and a foreign exchange of 8 billion across the three districts of Tirunelveli, Tiruchirapalli and Vellore.