• UC Davis Center for Watershed Sciences finds $1.84 billion in losses due to drought in 2015.

• Job losses and crop fallowing about 30 percent greater than 2014, but study notes that irrigation districts and farmers are showing more resilience than anticipated.

• Groundwater, water trading and operational flexibility have significantly reduced losses.

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Statement from CDFA Secretary Karen Ross on the findings:

“This report details harmful drought impacts in certain areas of the state where water supplies are most scarce. At the same time, the report demonstrates the overall resilience of California agriculture.  Through expanded water conservation, careful use of groundwater, and deployment of new technologies, our agriculture sector has remained productive for the benefit of consumers across the country.  As the drought stretches on, our farmers and ranchers will continue to innovate.”

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News release from UC Davis:

Drought costs California agriculture $1.84B and 10,100 jobs in 2015

The drought is tightening its grip on California agriculture, squeezing about 30 percent more workers and cropland out of production than in 2014, according to the latest drought impact report by the UC Davis Center for Watershed Sciences.

In 2015, the state’s agricultural economy directly will lose about $1.84 billion and 10,100 jobs because of the drought, the report estimated, with the Central Valley hardest hit.

The analysis also forecasts how the industry will fare if the drought persists through 2017.

‘Not a free lunch’

Currently, the industry overall remains robust. The agricultural economy continues to grow in this fourth year of severe drought, thanks mostly to the state’s vast but declining reserves of groundwater, which will offset about 70 percent of the surface water shortage this year, the researchers said.

California is the world’s richest food-producing region. Continued strong global demand and prices for many of its fruits, nuts and vegetables has helped sustain the farm economy along with intrastate water transfers and shifts in growing locations.

“We’re getting by remarkably well this year — much better than many had predicted — but it’s not a free lunch,” said lead author Richard Howitt, a UC Davis professor emeritus of agricultural and resource economics.

The heavy reliance on groundwater comes at ever-increasing energy costs as farmers pump deeper and drill more wells. Some of the heavy pumping is in basins already in severe overdraft — where groundwater use greatly exceeds replenishment of aquifers — inviting further land subsidence, water quality problems and diminishing reserves needed for future droughts.

Further, several small rural communities continue to suffer from high unemployment and drying up of domestic wells because of the drought, particularly in the Tulare Basin.

“If a drought of this intensity persists beyond 2015, California’s agricultural production and employment will continue to erode,” said co-author Josué Medellín-Azuara, a water economist with the UC Davis Center for Watershed Sciences.

Major conclusions

The UC Davis team used computer models and the latest estimates of surface water availability from state and federal water projects and local water districts federal state and local water projects. They forecast several drought-related impacts in the state’s major agricultural regions for the current growing season, including:

• The direct costs of drought to agriculture will be $1.84 billion for 2015. The total impact to all economic sectors is an estimated $2.74 billion, compared with $2.2 billion in 2014. The state’s farmers and ranchers currently receive more than $46 billion annually in gross revenues, a small fraction of California’s $1.9 trillion-a-year economy.
• The loss of about 10,100 seasonal jobs directly related to farm production, compared with the researchers’ 2014 drought estimate of 7,500 jobs. When considering the spillover effects of the farm losses on all other economic sectors, the employment impact of the 2015 drought more than doubles to 21,000 lost jobs.
• Surface water shortages will reach nearly 8.7 million acre-feet, which will be mostly offset by increased groundwater pumping of 6 million acre-feet.
• Net water shortages of 2.7 million acre-feet will cause roughly 542,000 acres to be idled — 114,000 more acres than the researchers’ 2014 drought estimate. Most idled land is in the Tulare Basin.
• The effects of continued drought through 2017 (assuming continued 2014 water supplies) will likely be 6 percent worse than in 2015, with the net water shortage increasing to 2.9 million acre-feet a year. Gradual decline in groundwater pumping capacity and water elevations will add to the incremental costs of a prolonged drought.

Groundwater regulations could help

The scientists noted that new state groundwater regulations requiring local agencies to attain sustainable yields could eventually reverse the depletion of underground reserves.

“The transition will cause some increased fallowing of cropland or longer crop rotations but will help preserve California’s ability to support more profitable permanent and vegetable crops during drought,” said co-author Jay Lund, director of the UC Davis Center for Watershed Sciences.

The report was primarily funded by the California Department of Food and Agriculture.

Other authors on the report include Daniel Sumner, a UC Davis professor of agricultural and resource economics and director of the UC Agricultural Issues Center, and Duncan MacEwan of the ERA Economics consulting firm in Davis.

Link to report

By Marybeth Bizjak

Kurt Spataro and Suzanne Peabody Ashworth at Peabody Ranch in West Sacramento. Photography by Marc Thomas Kallweit

It’s 4 p.m. on a Tuesday at Formoli’s Bistro in East Sacramento, and farmer Susan Hanks has just dropped off a box of produce. Tucked in with the tarragon, thyme and oregano is a surprise for chef Aimal Formoli: a few pounds of loquats, still attached to the knobby branches on which they were growing in the Rio Linda sunshine just a few hours earlier.

A farm in Davis has started a new program allowing people to rent chickens to get a first-timer’s taste of backyard chicken farming.

For those still trying to find a place in the pecking order of backyard chicken farming, this is for you. Flyway Farm in Davis has hatched a new idea where you can rent a hen and try before you buy—in case you chicken out.

MORE INFO: Rent-a-Chicken Sacramento

“If you have a landlord that maybe wants you to prove that having chickens isn’t disruptive, you can do that, too,” said Linda Easton. “You can see how your dogs are going to get along with the chickens, how your kids are going to get along with your chickens; so there are a lot of good reasons to rent.”

Easton says for about $75 a month, you can rent the hens along with all the feed and supplies you’ll need, as well as a hand-built coop on wheels.

“This space is just big enough for them to stay cool and protected in the summertime but also its small enough so they can use their body heat to stay warm in the wintertime, even on the coldest night,” she said.

The coop is designed to keep predators and the curious neighbor’s dog away, so the hens can lay about a dozen eggs a week.

“Fresh pasture raised eggs are actually more nutritious for you than the store-bought eggs,” she said. “They have a higher level of Omega-3s, lower cholesterol.”

Easton says raising backyard chickens isn’t necessarily easy and they do come with responsibilities.

“You do need to check on them every day,” she said.

But Flyway Farm will give the basic training you’ll need to put all your eggs in one basket.

“The work you put into it is definitely worth it especially when you get those fabulous eggs and you have these pets that are a lot of fun,” she said.

State Climatologist Michael Anderson issued the following statement on potential El Niño conditions:

“California cannot count on potential El Niño conditions to halt or reverse drought conditions.  Historical weather data shows us that at best, there is a 50/50 chance of having a wetter winter. Unfortunately, due to shifting climate patterns, we cannot even be that sure.”

Additional background:
The current drought has resulted in observations of new, record-high temperatures and record low snowpack for California. Five of the lowest 10 snowpacks on record have occurred in the last decade, including the past four years.  The seasonal snowpack is a key element to California’s water resources management, modulating winter precipitation into spring runoff for beneficial use through the dry summer.

As California heads into a new water year (October 1 to September 30) with a potential fifth year of drought and expectations of El Niño impacts in play during the winter, questions mount on what can be expected of winter temperatures, precipitation and snowpack for California.

Unfortunately, a historical look at past years with similar El Niño conditions as currently forecasted provide little guidance as to what California might expect this winter.  Of the seven years since 1950 with similar ENSO signals (1958, 1966, 1973, 1983, 1988, 1992, and 1998) three were wet years, one was average and three were dry (with water year 1992 perpetuating a drought).  Past years were cooler than the temperatures we are experiencing now which will impact the rain/snow boundary for any storms that materialize this winter.

For more detail and information on the unpredictable nature of the El Niño phenomenon, visit: http://water.ca.gov/waterconditions/docs/Drought_ENSO_handout4.pdf.

As this nearly 60-year-old video shows, times have changed, but the need for an accurate system of measurement has not. The demands of California’s sealers of weights and measures are the same as for English practitioners in 1956 – take the necessary steps to ensure fair commerce. For more information visit CDFA’s Division of Measurement Standards web page.

Gov. Jerry Brown signed into law Senate Bill 65, legislation by Senator Lois Wolk, D-Solano, changing an outdated labeling law that enabled olive oils to say they were produced in California, or a region of California.

“As California’s olive oil industry continues to grow, it is critical that labels accurately reflect the product consumers are buying,” Wolk said, who chairs the Agriculture Subcommittee on Olive Oil Production and Emerging Products. “If olive oil uses ‘California’ on the label, then 100 percent of the oil must be from olives grown in California. If a reference is made to a specific region in California, then that’s where the majority of that olive oil should have been grown. There must be truth in labeling.”

In addition to requirements relating to the use of “California” on labels, SB 65 requires that if an oil’s label references a specific region in California, then at least 85 percent of the oil, by weight, must be from olives grown in that specific region.

Additionally, if reference is made to a specific estate within California, then at least 95 percent of the oil, by weight, must be from olives grown on that specific estate.

SB 65 reflects new standards set by the Olive Oil Commission of California, established by a law Wolk authored in 2013. The commission engages in olive oil quality and nutritional research and recommends grading and labeling standards to the California Department of Food and Agriculture.

Link to story

Using aquaponics at urban farms.

By Katie Shepard

As California moves through its fourth summer of drought, cutting back on water use means shorter showers, fuller dishwashers and drier lawns for most people living in urban areas.

But for small farms nestled between city streets, saving water means recycling it — and finding new ways to keep plants alive without wasting the precious liquid.

The Growing Experience in Long Beach uses some of the latest drought-conscious growing techniques for urban agriculture.

Unlike the large industrial farms that give California its reputation as the salad bowl of the nation, urban farmers don’t have to let fields sit fallow to reduce water use. The small-scale operations leave room for more creative approaches to drought-friendly growing practices. For those producing and selling food in the city, the drought has provided opportunities as well as obstacles.

“In a way it’s been even good for us because people are more inclined to see we’re doing a good thing,” Jimmy Ng, program director and manager at the Growing Experience in Long Beach, said. “People can see that to some extent and appreciate how much less [water and resources] it takes to get this food to market.”

Romaine lettuce, watercress, basil, mint and bok choy grow in vertical towers between pieces of sponge-like growing material instead of dirt. The plants are watered through a closed-loop system that pumps water to the top of each column and collects whatever drips down to the bottom to recirculate into large holding tanks. Fish swim inside the tanks, adding nutrients the plants need to survive. Then the water is pumped back up to the top of the towers to trickle down through the plant roots and back to the fish again.

The system, known as aquaponics, uses less water than traditional soil planting because very little water is lost to evaporation and none is absorbed into the ground. Four times as many plants can grow in one square foot because the columns provide extra space for the leaves and roots to spread upward.

Some Los Angeles City Council members hope there will be more urban farms filling their own city’s empty lots in the near future. Councilman Felipe Fuentes said his district has properties that have been blighted for years, but the landowners won’t improve them. Fuentes and Councilman Curren Price have proposed a measure to offer tax incentives for property owners who rent or donate their land for agricultural purposes for at least five years.

Because Los Angeles’ watering restrictions apply only to grass lawns, urban farmers would be able to establish flourishing new gardens.

Not only would these urban farms replace ugly, empty lots, but they also would create community spaces that encourage activity, healthy eating and potential economic growth, Fuentes said.

“These farms speak to a lot of opportunity for Los Angeles,” he said. “They can fortify the nutritional balance of peoples’ lives.”

Municipalities can place regulations on urban farms — which are often not zoned as agricultural sites — as if the farm were a home or a store. And the water costs the same as the liquid running through the tap at home, which is often more expensive than water specifically allocated to agriculture.

The Growing Experience waters its plants just twice a week because of Long Beach regulations, and it is experimenting with other methods to reduce water use.

In a corner of the 4.5-acre farm, space is reserved for native California and drought-resistant plants. These crops are watered heavily in the first few weeks to anchor roots in the ground and give seedlings plenty of hydration. But for the rest of the season, the plants get water only from whatever rain falls on the lot. The technique is called “dry farming.”

Reduced watering can produce smaller fruits and vegetables than shoppers are used to. But the smaller food is no less tasty, Ng said.

The Growing Experience’s subscribers agree to accept smaller produce in drought years. But when the dry spell breaks, they will be sent larger fruits and vegetables every week, Ng said.

Link to story

By Katie L. Strong

Humans love Sriracha sauce, and the pleasurable, painful sensation that makes us want to slather tacos, rice and barbecue with it and other spicy condiments comes down to one molecule: capsaicin.

Professors Jie Zheng and Vladimir Yarov-Yarovoy at UC Davis, in collaboration with researchers in China, recently got an unprecedented, close-up view of this molecule, as well as what happens inside our bodies when we eat the spicy foods that contain it.

Cracking the code on how this spice affects the body could do more than satisfy culinary curiosity: It could help scientists design medication for a broad array of ailments, such as those related to cardiac dysfunction, neurological disorders and chronic pain.

“We can eventually use this method in the future to design new, more selective drugs that would have less side effects for patients,” Yarov-Yarovoy said. “That’s where we’re going.”