While the current drought-influenced thinking causes most of us to consider how water can be better stored, conserved and conveyed, one recent report emphasizes the importance of protecting, enhancing and using the supply that is below ground.
First of all it acknowledges that much of California’s groundwater has been depleted or widely degraded, and concludes that new regulations, some of them still emerging, are resulting in a historic shift in the way the state’s agriculture sector is helping manage and protect groundwater resources.
An introduction to this University of California research document appeared in the most recent (July-September) issue of California Agriculture, the university’s quarterly peer reviewed magazine. The body of the report was reserved for online presentation. Its author is Thomas Harter, Agriculture and Natural Resources Extension Specialist at UC Davis.
The author acknowledges that the demand for groundwater has increased steadily as more of the state’s agricultural acreage has advanced from rangeland and field crops to permanent crops. But the demand on the underground aquifers has come from municipal and industrial users as well as the population has exploded.
Because many people have been alerted to the importance and strategic necessity of the underground water supply by recent drought-related emphasis, previous steps taken to protect the aquifers is sometimes overlooked. Harter chronicles those, making readers aware of the many laws, regulations, organizations and restrictions already in place.
At the same time he points out the many reasons we have not restored those underground pools. Much of the diversion from underground replenishment has been done in the name of water conservation. Even lining with concrete the canals that used to leak water to the underground has had a part in the depletion of the underground pools.
Charts and illustrations in Harter’s article place significant emphasis on the Tulare Lake Basin, once the largest body of fresh water west of the Mississippi (and perhaps shallowest). As an area of intense agricultural production, with and without irrigation, it no longer sends water to the aquifers below it. The basin is perhaps the most extreme example of starving the underground.
To correct the steps that have been taken to shut off such leakage Harter states that all associations and alliances that have been established for that purpose will have to be utilized. He cautions that it probably will be inconvenient as some popular irrigation practices are modified if not discontinued, and expensive as equipment and procedures, not all of them invented or developed yet, are applied.
Hand wringing is not part of the solution, as Harter presents the opportunities ahead. What is a major aspect of the preservation and replenishment is cooperation. If that overrides the efforts he believes recovery of the underground basins is entirely possible, even probable.
New techniques and tools for measuring the recovery and the streams that support it can be expected. He reminds his readers of the consternation that once faced gasoline retailers as sophisticated instruments were developed that detected leakage from underground storage tanks. It was widespread and considered of little significance until the instrumentation told us otherwise.
Excavations to remove and then replace those leaky tanks were expensive. Marketing opportunities were forfeited, and customers of the affected retailers were upset. But the whole episode has been mostly forgotten or otherwise put behind us.
Harter foresees a day when the deep concerns about depleted underground aquifers and the expense and exasperation of correcting its causes are mere memories. Somewhere over the rainbow …
But a comforting word from an authoritative source may be just what is needed, today, tomorrow and far into the less thirsty future.
Thanksgiving is built around a most basic blessing: food.
What stands out as the highlight of this day for me, though isn’t the food itself so much as the sharing of it. The people around our tables – friends and family members – are special to us, and more than a few are people whom we don’t see as often as we should. Sharing this meal and this day with them is something to look forward to, and to celebrate. Food is a fitting centerpiece for such an occasion (“shameless plug” alert), especially if it was grown in California.
This annual gathering is a great recipe for memories and stories, and for laughter. We “catch up.” We reconnect. We welcome new members into the family fold. As holidays go, Thanksgiving done right is a casual, comfortable affair that is just the right warm-up for the bustle to come.
For our farmers and ranchers, we are thankful this season for the hints of rain and snow that have begun to come our way at long last – may they be a sign of what’s to come.
Part of my Thanksgiving holiday tradition is to help prepare and serve a meal for the homeless hosted by my church in downtown Sacramento. It is a reminder for me that the things we are thankful for may bear a striking similarity to the things we shouldn’t take for granted, from prosperity and health to water, safe shelter, food and family. Not all of us – not even in bountiful California – are so fortunate. I am grateful for the opportunity to serve ALL Californians.
Around many tables this year, families will thank soldiers, past and present, for our safety. We will include parents and siblings, teachers and neighbors in our thoughts and thanks. My family will also thank our farmers, ranchers and farmworkers. They work hard for all of us and the fruits of their labor bring us together, at Thanksgiving and all year long.
Secretary Ross talking with Los Angeles Times reporter Peter King last week in Clovis as part of the Times’ public affairs series, “The California Conversation – Water in the West.” Photo – AgNetWest.com
By Andrea Castillo
Some of the state’s top water officials, along with local farmers and activists, convened in Clovis on (November 18) to talk about agriculture and the impact of the drought.
Los Angeles Times reporters hosted the conversation, called “Water in the West,” as part of a series of talks around the state. Helping sponsor the event were the San Diego Union-Tribune and Netafim, an agriculture drip irrigation company.
Around 100 people showed up at the Clovis Veterans Memorial District building to listen to experts including Karen Ross, secretary of the California Department of Food and Agriculture, and Mark Cowin, director of the California Department of Water Resources, give an overview of the issues that have emerged during the drought.
Around 100 people showed up at the Clovis Veterans Memorial District building to listen to experts including Karen Ross, secretary of the California Department of Food and Agriculture, and Mark Cowin, director of the California Department of Water Resources, give an overview of the issues that have emerged during the drought.
Cowin said the past four years have given California a crash course in how to adjust to limited amounts of water. But he said the state still needs to become more efficient and invest more in its water systems.
“It’s a matter of preparing for the future,” he said. “These past few years have given us, I think, a preview of what we can expect more of in the next century. If scientists are correct, if global climate change affects California the way we now expect it to, we can expect more of these extended dry periods.”
Nikiko Masumoto is already preparing for climate change on her family’s organic peach, nectarine and grape farm in Del Rey. The Masumotos have experimented with deficit irrigation (limiting water) but grew smaller peaches as a result.
Masumoto said the marketplace isn’t in favor of small fruit. She said she hopes the drought leads people to understand that size doesn’t dictate value of food.
“We have a very narrow definition of what a perfect peach, for example, is,” she said. “It might not always be pretty.”
Times correspondent Peter King, a Fresno native and former Bee staff writer, moderated a separate question-and-answer session with Ross. He asked her to address the paradox between people hearing about the suffering of farmers and rural communities, while at the same time California is experiencing record crop production value.
Ross said farmers are resilient and becoming more productive with the water available by focusing on higher economic uses, such as nut trees. That adaptation cloaks the harsh reality that some have felt during the drought, she said.
“Agriculture is very site-specific and where the drought has impacted is very site-specific. We can’t let those numbers be a one-size-fits-all.”
But Sarah Woolf, a farmer and president of the water management service Water Wise, said there isn’t enough water to meet the demands of a growing population, environmental protection and the agriculture industry. She stressed the importance of being more efficient in water use and improving storage and groundwater supplies.
“There’s land not being farmed,” she said. “I don’t think, as a farmer and someone who recognizes the high demand of California food products, that we should decrease our agricultural footprint.”
Cowin agreed about the need for better drought preparation, but he said there’s no way to avoid its effects completely.
“I don’t mean to sound pessimistic here, but I do think it’s not likely that we’re going to make such investment that we’re going to be able to withstand a four- or five-year drought of the nature we’ve seen the last few years without some level of impact,” he said.
The American Farm Bureau Federation’s 30th annual informal price survey of classic items found on the Thanksgiving Day dinner table indicates the average cost of this year’s feast for 10 is $50.11, a 70-cent increase from last year’s average of $49.41.
The big ticket item – a 16-pound turkey – came in at a total of $23.04 this year. That’s roughly $1.44 per pound, an increase of less than 9 cents per pound, or a total of $1.39 per whole turkey, compared to 2014.
“Retail prices seem to have stabilized quite a bit for turkey, which is the centerpiece of the meal in our marketbasket,” AFBF Deputy Chief Economist John Anderson said. “There were some production disruptions earlier this year due to the highly pathogenic Avian influenza outbreak in the Midwest. Turkey production is down this year but not dramatically. Our survey shows a modest increase in turkey prices compared to last year. But we’re now starting to see retailers feature turkeys aggressively for the holiday. According to USDA retail price reports, featured prices fell sharply just last week and were actually lower than last year,” he added.
The AFBF survey shopping list includes turkey, bread stuffing, sweet potatoes, rolls with butter, peas, cranberries, a relish tray of carrots and celery, pumpkin pie with whipped cream, and beverages of coffee and milk, all in quantities sufficient to serve a family of 10. There is also plenty for leftovers.
Foods showing the largest increases this year in addition to turkey were pumpkin pie mix, a dozen brown-n-serve rolls, cubed bread stuffing and pie shells. A 30-ounce can of pumpkin pie mix was $3.20; a 14-ounce package of cubed bread stuffing, $2.61; and two nine-inch pie shells, $2.47.
“Despite concerns earlier this fall about pumpkin production due to wet weather, the supply of canned product will be adequate for this holiday season,” Anderson said.
Items that declined modestly in price were mainly dairy items including one gallon of whole milk, $3.25; a combined group of miscellaneous items, including coffee and ingredients necessary to prepare the meal (butter, evaporated milk, onions, eggs, sugar and flour), $3.18; a half pint of whipping cream, $1.94; and 12 ounces of fresh cranberries, $2.29. A one-pound relish tray of carrots and celery (79 cents) and one pound of green peas ($1.52) also decreased slightly in price.
The average cost of the dinner has remained around $49 since 2011. This year’s survey totaled over $50 for the first time.
“America’s farmers and ranchers are able to provide a bounty of food for a classic Thanksgiving dinner that many of us look forward to all year,” Anderson said. “We are fortunate to be able to provide a special holiday meal for 10 people for just over $5 per serving.”
The USDA has announced $4.8 million in grants for 74 projects spanning 39 states that support the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) efforts to connect child nutrition programs with local farmers and ranchers through its Farm to School Program. Grant recipients in California will receive $672,795.
“Farm to school programs work—for schools, for producers, and for communities,” said USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack. “By serving nutritious and locally grown foods, engaging students in hands-on lessons, and involving parents and community members, these programs provide children with a holistic experience that sets them up for a lifetime of healthy eating. With early results from our Farm to School Census indicating schools across the nation invested nearly $600 million in local products, farm to school also provides a significant and reliable market for local farmers and ranchers.”
USDA’s Farm to School Grants fund school districts, state and local agencies, tribal nations, agricultural producers, and non-profit organizations in their efforts to increase local foods served through child nutrition programs; teach children about food and agriculture through garden and classroom education; and develop schools’ and farmers’ capacities to participate in farm to school. Awards ranging from $20,000 to $100,000 are distributed in four different grant categories: Planning, Implementation, Support Service, and Training.For the 2016 school year, grants will serve more than 5,211 schools and 2.9 million students, nearly 40 percent of whom are eligible for free or reduced-price meals.
Farm to School programs help support California farmers and provide healthy, California-grown food to school children. CDFA strongly supports California’s Farm to School programs through its Office of Farm to Fork, which provides farm to school resources and helps California schools connect with California farmers through the online California Farmer Marketplace.
The California grant recipients are as follows:
Center for Ecoliteracy, Berkeley Grant Type: Support Service; $100,000
“California Thursdays” is a collaboration between the Center for Ecoliteracy and a network of school districts to serve freshly prepared school meals made from California-grown food. The network includes 42 districts that collectively serve over 250 million meals annually. This project will implement two new efforts: (1) a two-day training program to build capacity and provide technical expertise to nutrition services leaders, and (2) a robust website that features a public interface to improve communications and access to resources among the network.
County of Sonoma Department of Health Services, Santa Rosa Grant Type: Support Service; $94,580
The County of Sonoma Department of Health Services in California will work with key partners to expand farm to preschool programs at fifteen school-based pre-kindergarten sites serving low income families throughout Sonoma County. Activities will include Harvest of the Month educational tasting kits of farm fresh produce; procurement of locally grown foods into pre-kindergarten meal programs; increased hands-on learning in on-site gardens; and the development of comprehensive wellness policies that include farm to preschool language.
Konocti Unified School District, Lower Lake (Lake County) Grant Type: Planning; $45,000
Konocti Unified School District will increase the use of locally-grown foods in school meals, and the number of students that participate in those meals, by embedding farm to school best practices into school culture. Strategies include working with multiple schools, increasing local foods in summer meals, revising policies to facilitate local procurement, increasing school vegetable production, aligning experiential education with Common Core state standards, and engaging the community through marketing and promotion.
National Farm to School Network, San Francisco Grant Type: Training – National; $49,665
The National Farm to School Network will conduct advanced trainings to support school food service/nutrition directors and farmers/producers in sustaining and expanding their farm to school work. Training will be held in conjunction with the 8th National Farm to Cafeteria Conference happening June 2 through 4, 2016, in Madison, WI.
Pasadena Unified School District, Pasadena Grant Type: Implementation; $100,000
Pasadena Unified School District, previously a FY 2014 USDA Farm to School planning grantee, will systematically link fresh food procurement and preparation through staff and teacher training; classroom curriculum; and experiential activities for students in cafeterias, school gardens, and field trips to create an integrated, well-coordinated, and district-wide farm to school approach.
Plumas Unified School District, Quincy Grant Type: Planning; $45,000
Plumas Unified School District will develop a five year plan to expand the existing school gardens and production greenhouse to all 13 prekindergarten-12th grade public schools. Teachers, ranchers, farmers, social service agencies, and interested community members will be invited to provide input in developing a sustainable garden education and local procurement plan. Representatives from the three neighboring counties will be included to explore a regional approach.
Sacramento City Unified School District, Sacramento Grant Type: Implementation; $100,000
Sacramento City Unified School District, in partnership with the Food Literacy Center and Soil Born Farms, designed a farm to school project to include procurement of fresh vegetables, garden education, and nutrition education. This project will introduce a new vegetable each month to students in three pilot elementary schools and then to students throughout the district.
The Edible Schoolyard Project, Berkeley Grant Type: Training – National; $45,050
This project will pilot a new Edible Schoolyard Intensive professional development program for farm to school practitioners from across the country to increase the ability of maturing farm to school programs to sustain long-term success by educating participants about how to forge strong relationships between school food service staff, school leaders, and classroom, garden, and kitchen educators.
Yolo County Department of Agriculture, Woodland Grant Type: Support Service; $93,500
Building on the last three years of operating a successful farm to school program focused on procurement, this project will engage with local school districts to (1) acquire data on the quantity and frequency of foods being served through the meal programs, (2) track crop data for translation into yield for local farms, (3) provide training and writing services with farms to obtain their Good Agricultural Practices certification, and (4) provide services such as curated farm tours, farm availability listings, and business guidance for producers.
State employees donating fresh produce last week at the kick-off event for the 2015 State Employees Food Drive, at the Department of Public Health in Sacramento. 6,550 pounds of produce were donated, including contributions from participating local farms. A Sacramento Food Bank truck was on-hand to quickly transport the items back to its warehouse for distribution. CDFA is again serving as statewide coordinator for the food drive. An event later this week, the annual Turkey Drive, will collect frozen turkeys for the holiday tables of needy families.
What does organic actually mean? It’s tricky, because the word “organic” has at least two distinct meanings. It arose as the name for a movement with a particular belief system. Later, it also became a formal regulatory label governed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Meanwhile, most of us just want to know if organic means “better”: if it’s healthier, more sustainable, and, in short, worth the money.
My unsatisfying answer: It depends. There are spectacular organic farmers, and spectacular farmers who don’t comply with the organic rules (and their opposites). I equivocate here because the organic rules are more about process than outcomes. Instead of governing results — i.e. defining organic by the nutritional content of food, or environmental quality measurements on farms — the rules mostly govern the tools used in food production.
OK, let’s start with those official rules. What are they? And how good a job does each rule accomplish of actually making food “better”? I don’t aim to determine whether organic, overall, is “better” — I think that depends on the way farmers use their tools, not on which tools they use. Instead, I’ll try to tease apart the assumptions that link the rules to our judgements about goodness.
No synthetics
Basically, if humans made a substance, you can’t use it in organic farming. There are exceptions: There’s a list of approved synthetics that organic farmers can use under certain circumstances.
But the whole idea that “natural” is safer than synthetic is just wrong. It is true that we’ve had more time to get used to the natural hazards — and not as much trial and error to discover hazards in newer substances.
It’s often impossible, anyway, to say definitively whether something is natural or synthetic. The dividing line is subjective; “natural” means different things to different people. This hazy line between natural and non-natural has caused all sorts of controversy among farmers over the years. Julie Guthman, in her book Agrarian Dreams: The Paradox of Organic Farming in California, lists some of the arguments on this issue:
Several grape growers mentioned their frustration that cryolite [used as an insecticide] was being phased out as an unallowable substance because it was no longer being mined … its synthetic forms were completely prohibited. Black plastic is allowed for solarization [heating] or for mulching as long as it is removed from the field after use, yet solarization completely kills all biological activity in the soil … Other comments: “We can use Bt [a bacterial insecticide] but not urea, compost but not [heated] oil. How can you be more natural than crude oil?” “Why is it perfectly acceptable to drive tractors around that not only use diesel fuel but also worsen soil compaction?”
This one seems simple, but it’s surprisingly confusing, because the definition of GMO is squishier than you might think. For the organic standards “no GMOs” means no plant or animal can be used in organic food if it has a gene from another species that’s been put there by humans. It also means no meat or dairy from animals fed on GM fodder. (Organic farmers can use manure from animals fed GMOs for fertilizer.)
But organic farmers can, and do, use plants that have been genetically modified with ionizing radiation or chemicals. There are several great organic crops made through this kind of mutagenesis, including my favorite organic brown rice.
And as scientists get more skilled at genetic engineering, the focus is shifting toward making small revisions in the genome rather than moving DNA from one species to another. The products of this kind of gene editing are not always defined as GMOs.
No sewage
Only non-organic farmers can use treated, sterilized municipal sewage for fertilizer. The technical term here is biosolids: dried, composted human poop that has come out of city sewage treatment. Organic people don’t like it because who knows what else besides crap ends up in there — motor oil, medications, Drano? But it sure would be more sustainable to close the cycle and reuse nutrients rather than flushing them into the ocean.
No radiation
Sometimes people expose foods to ionizing radiation as a food safety measure. There aren’t many foods that are irradiated — but some are, to kill disease-causing germs. You can tell because those foods have this label. Anyway, organic can’t do that.
Fertilizer
Conventional farms often get fertilizer that is synthesized from the air and natural gas. Organic farms mostly get it from composted manure. In addition, organic farmers may use nitrogen from South American mines, which has the same characteristics of synthetic nitrogen, but also contains salt (a potential problem for soil health). You can read my deep dive on nitrogen fertilizer here. In brief: Both approaches to fertilizer are appropriate in their place, for complex reasons having to do with land use change and the nitrogen cycle.
Rotation
To qualify as organic, farmers must rotate what they plant on any given plot of land. This breaks up insect pest life cycles and encourages biodiversity. Most conventional farmers do crop rotation, too — the classic Midwestern system alternates between corn and soy every year. Organic farmers often do longer rotations: corn, soy, alfalfa, for example.
Weed and pest control
This is a big one. When conventional farmers have a weed or insect problem, they often control it with a chemical pesticide. Organic farmers rely on plowing, weeding, pheromone traps, and by providing habitats for predatory insects.
Organic farms also have a set of approved pesticides that they can use — for instance, copper and sulfur are both widely used, as are oils, which are sprayed to smother insects. Organic pesticides tend to be less toxic than synthetic pesticides, but are used in larger quantities per acre.
You are a lot less likely to be exposed to pesticide residue if you eat organic — but keep in mind that the exposure to pesticide you get from residues is way below the tolerances set by the EPA.
Workers on organic farms don’t come into contact with the more toxic pesticides. But Guthman points out that they do come into contact with sulfur, which is “said to cause more worker injuries in California than any other agricultural input.”
Controlling weeds without herbicides creates complications for workers as well. Farmworkers have successfully banned the use of the short-handled hoe, which forced them to bend close to the ground as they weeded crops. But in California, organic farmers are allowed an exception to the rule — instead of a short-handled hoe, farmers can have their laborers weed by hand. The classic labor rights issues are just as fraught, or even worse, for workers on organic farms, bothsmallandlarge.
Animals
OK — when it comes to organic meat and dairy, here’s the deal:
Organic feed
For animals to be organic, you gotta feed them organic corn or other organic kibble.
Pasture
If it’s a ruminant animal — a grass eater — it’s got to be out on pasture at least 120 days a year.
Access outdoors
And if it’s a chicken, pig, or other non-ruminant, its must have access to the outdoors. Sometimes, however, that may just be a door to the terrifying beyondthat no animal ever uses.
No antibiotics, no growth hormones
If your animals are going to be organic, no growth hormones are allowed and no antibiotics are allowed, period. If the animal gets sick, however, the farmer is still required to treat it with antibiotics if they are needed — but then the animal is no longer organic.
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Those are the main rules. Oh, you’ve probably seen a ton of labels — Oregon Tilth, California Certified Organic, Midwest Organic Service — but you can basically ignore those: These organizations just serve as the certifying agencies that check the USDA organic standards.
If farmers and environmental scientists were to design the perfect system, it might not be strictly organic. For instance, in some situations it would make more environmental sense to use a little bit of a synthetic pesticide than to spray the oils, copper, and sulfur that the organic program allows. Using compost and manure is really good for soils. But we also have to use some synthetic fertilizer if we want to shrink our agricultural footprint and stop cutting down forests. Even growth hormones make sense from a greenhouse gas perspective: A faster growing steer spends fewer days burping up methane and needs fewer acres devoted to feeding it. None of this is simple.
No one has ownership over the term organic. Yes, as a certification it is defined and regulated by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and other government agencies around the world. But before any of that, it was a set of principles. My reading of organic literature, and this review by the National Research Commission, suggests that organic belief systems are built on two main pillars:
Managing biological systems: Organic practitioners strive to understand and influence their farms on an ecosystem level, controlling pests and nutrient cycles by creating habitat (in the soil, hedgerows, and fields).
Avoiding synthetic chemicals: Organic practitioners often feel that synthetic chemicals are not as safe as natural chemicals because they haven’t been around as long, which means we’ve had less time to see potential dangers. They also often feel that synthetics allow farmers to fix problems too directly, which may prevent ecosystem-level management (see No. 1). For instance, if a farmer uses a highly effective synthetic pesticide to save her peppers from great horned tomato worms, she may not have the incentive to learn about the predator-prey relationship that (perhaps) might be manipulated to control the insects.
This stands in opposition what might be called the industrial belief system. The main pillars of that philosophy:
Supporting humanity: The primary philosophical driver for many industrial practitioners is humanitarian: They want to feed people, and see themselves as a foundation for civilization. By providing food they allow others to specialize in other areas, building electric cars, discovering cures for cancer, writing “Hotline Bling,” etc.
A quest for efficiency: If the goal is to free humanity from labor on the land, any improvement in efficiency is seen as honorable. Therefore we see tremendous emphasis placed on increasing yields and decreasing labor, both of which make food cheaper.
Any adequate analysis of agricultural sustainability should try on both these pairs of ideological sunglasses. It seems to me that the industrial partisans — looking through the rose-colored glasses of ever-improving efficiency and technological progress — have at times been blind to inefficiencies at the ecosystem level (dead zones in lakes and oceans, greenhouse gas emissions). Likewise, organic partisans — looking through the dark glasses of environmental decline and technological failure — have at times been blind to imperatives for land-use efficiency (there really is a lot of evidence that we can preserve more biodiversity by farming more intensively), and to the true humanitarian improvements that have come with industrialization.
We’ve got to do it all: Work in concert with ecosystems, grow the raw materials to support a thriving civilization, do it on a land area small enough to preserve wilderness, and accomplish that with tools that won’t hurt us. The organic ethos gets us part way there. To go the rest of the distance, we’ve got to embrace the good from both belief systems.
More than four-million people in California are food-insecure and need a little help. It just doesn’t seem right to have that many people lacking nourishment in a state that produces such a bounty of healthy food.
In recognition of that need, five years ago, the State Board of Food and Agriculture launched an annual program with the California Association of Food Banks (CAFB) to focus on agriculture’s commitment to alleviate hunger. It’s called Farm-to-Food Bank Month, and it happens each December.
Farm to Food Bank Month is a reminder of the important contributions from farmers and ranchers to families in need. Unfortunately, the need isn’t limited to the holiday season. Still, California agriculture has made great strides in addressing food insecurity through the work of organizations like the CAFB, Ag Against Hunger, California Young Farmers and Ranchers, Hidden Harvest, and CA Grown, in addition to the individual efforts of farmers and ranchers who donate directly to organizations in their local communities.
Over the last five years we have had tremendous support from producers of rice, citrus, fresh fruits and vegetables, tree nuts, and eggs, to name just a few commodities. In fact, more than 120 family farms have worked with the CAFB through the years to provide more than 140 million pounds food annually to food banks. The State Board has set a goal to increase that amount to 200 million pounds.
Over the next several weeks, we will be highlighting the deep rooted connection that farmers and ranchers have to their communities in addressing the issue of hunger. We will also be supporting an annual donation event, coordinated with the CAFB, on December 16th at the Community Food Bank in Fresno.
Making a donation is quick and easy – to donate or make a future pledge, please contact Steve Linkhart at the CAFB at 510-350-9916 or SteveLinkhart@cafoodbanks.org.
SACRAMENTO – As California prepares for a fifth year of drought, Governor Edmund G. Brown Jr. today issued an executive order that calls for additional actions to build on the state’s ongoing response to record dry conditions and assist recovery efforts from this year’s devastating wildfires.
The full text of the executive order can be found here.
California’s Drought Response Governor Brown declared a drought state of emergency in January 2014 and directed state agencies to take all necessary actions to respond to drought conditions. In April, Governor Brown announced the first-ever 25 percent statewide mandatory water reductions and a series of actions to help save water, increase enforcement to prevent wasteful water use, streamline the state’s drought response and invest in new technologies that will make California more drought resilient. Californians have responded with unprecedented conservation efforts, exceeding the Governor’s water reduction order for a fourth consecutive month. To date, guided by the California Water Action Plan, the state has committed hundreds of millions of dollars – including Water Bond funds – to emergency drought relief, disaster assistance, water conservation and infrastructure projects across the state. Efforts are also underway to establish a framework for sustainable, local groundwater management for the first time in California’s history based on legislation signed by Governor Brown last year. Throughout the year, Governor Brown has convened mayors, business leaders and top agricultural, environmental and urban water agencyofficials from across California to discuss the state’s drought and conservation efforts.
In October, Governor Brown declared a state of emergency on the unprecedented tree die-off and sought federal action to help mobilize additional resources for the safe removal of dead and dying trees, building on provisions in the April 2014 executive order to redouble the state’s drought response.
To learn more about the state’s drought response, visit: Drought.CA.Gov.
Every Californian should take steps to conserve water. Find out how at SaveOurWater.com.
A field of dead almond trees is seen next to a field of growing almond trees in the Central Valley. REUTERS/Lucy Nicholson
By Nathanael Johnson
First comes the drought, then the deluge. It’s not just that climate change is making the weather more extreme, with hotter dry spells and warmer winters that transform mountain snowpack to water. It’s also that the drought has actually made flooding more likely by diminishing the soil’s capacity to soak up moisture. It’s as if dryness defends its turf against wetness — baking the dirt into an impermeable crust, or turning it into a hydrophobic crumb that causes raindrops to bead off.
The result: more scarcity where people need water most, and greater abundance were we don’t want it at all. In other words, the water that could trickle down to overdrawn aquifers and refill dry wells instead ends up lapping against your bedspread. We’ve already seen floods in Texas and Los Angeles; more are bound to come.
There’s a potential solution: redirect swollen rivers onto farmland to recharge groundwater while also protecting cities in flood zones. As Heather Mack has written for Grist, researchers have tested this out with a few innovative farmers in California’s San Joaquin Valley, and it worked great. The water sank into the ground, and the crops were none the worse for wear.
So now people are asking, how much of the problem could this fix? Two recently published studies are providing the first estimates.
How much water is there?
California farmers pump about 30 percent of their irrigation water from wells in a typical year — a total of about 34 million acre feet (the amount needed to fill a one-acre tub with a foot of water; it’s roughly equal to a gajillion gallons).
That’s a lot, but California farmland aquifers are already getting over 31 million acre feet in recharge each year. The annual overdraft is 1.1 to 2.6 million acre feet. This is an average: This year, it’s much worse; at other times it’s much better. For our back-of-the-envelope figuring, let’s stick with the average, which includes both the wet and dry years.
If we could capture all of California’s floods, we’d have no trouble balancing the groundwater accounts, but the researchers I talked to said that the state is nowhere close to being able to do that. One big problem: California often gets floods in the Sacramento River basin, in the northern half of the state, where groundwater levels are fairly healthy. There’s no way to magically teleport floodwaters from north to south before they hit cities.
A new study commissioned by the California Water Foundation took a close look at three counties in the San Joaquin River Basin, where groundwater is overtapped. This study found an average overdraft of 250,000 acre feet per year, and average winter flood flows in the region’s rivers of 253,400 acre feet per year. So the water is there!
Of course, there are problems. That water comes in large pulses that would swamp the existing canals and ditches if water managers tried to channel it all onto fields. The study estimates that the region could only move 130,000 acre feet of water out of rivers with the existing canals. And then we have to ask, where do we put all that water?
How much land is suitable for flooding?
What sort of farmland can we inundate? The flood-the-farms idea will only work if the soils allow for deep percolation. The land has to be flat; you obviously can’t flood rolling hills. We should rule out any land with contaminated soils — we don’t want salts, pesticides, and fertilizers flushing into the aquifers. And farmers won’t volunteer to flood any field if it’s bad for business — if the waters are likely to damage soil structures or hurt the orchards. After accounting for each of those limits, how much farmland is left?
Approximately 3.6 million acres, according to a research team led by Toby O’Geen, a soil scientist at the University of California Agriculture and Natural Resources Cooperative Extension. That’s plenty. In a recent paper, O’Geen et al. wrote, “A preliminary calculation based only on soil properties and crop type shows that landscapes rated Excellent or Good could be used to bank as much as 1.2 million acre feet of water per day.” At that rate you could eliminate the state’s entire overdraft with just two days of floodwater.
But again, it’s not so simple. The researchers note that this land isn’t necessarily connected to the water (again, the lack of canals). And each field may have complications: a hesitant farmer, variations in the soil profile, heaps of red tape. Many farmers have replaced flood irrigation systems with micro sprinklers, or drip systems, and in some cases have taken out the old ditches or completely regraded the fields, said Thomas Harter, a UC-Davis researcher who collaborated with O’Geen on the mapping project. Those researchers have made interactive maps available online in hopes that farmers and water officials will combine that data with local knowledge to find the realistic spots.
If we want a sense of how much flood water could realistically get to those green spots on the maps, we can return to that California Water Foundation study. In that area, if you recall, there is an average overdraft (the amount of water farmers are pumping out of the ground in excess of what goes back in) of 250,000 acre feet per year. Realistically, farmers could be adding 52,000 acre feet of water per year to aquifers by diverting flood water onto fields, according to that study. That would cut the overdraft by 20 percent.
If the combined estimates of floodwater and land to absorb it hold true for the rest of the state, we may have solved 20 percent of the problem. But we are still missing 80 percent of that 1.2 to 2.6 million acre feet of overdraft. “It’s obviously not solving the problem, but it’s a first big bite,” said Daniel Mountjoy, director of resource stewardship for Sustainable Conservation, a California nonprofit that has been an active player in the groundwater recharge investigation. Where does the rest of the water come from?
In the end, it will come from farmers taking land out of production, or switching to more drought-tolerant crops. But Mountjoy also thinks it could be possible to nudge that 20 percent higher. So far we are just looking at the cheapest option. We could spend more — build more ditches, enlarge canals, build up berms for deeper inundations — and we’d get more water into the ground. In addition, the study only considered floods that came from November to March. Additional big storm events can also come in April, May, and June. It’s possible that farmers could take water later into the spring, even as the crops are growing.
Sustainable Conservation is now working with the California almond growers to study how farmers might flood their orchards without hurting the trees. Tree fruit growers and grape farmers are also investigating the opportunity. Groundwater recharge won’t keep every acre of farmland in business, but I bet it will keep a lot of farms chugging as they feel the squeeze of California’s new groundwater law — which requires farmers to take no more water out of the ground than goes in.
If farmers embrace groundwater recharge, it could keep them in business and reduce flooding. But my favorite aspect of ground water recharge is that it would help desiccated riparian environments — rivers that have become trickles, and creeks that have gone dry. The Water Foundation study found that 40 percent of the water from flooded fields would end up in groundwater below those fields, while 17 percent flowed to groundwater elsewhere. The final 43 percent of the water — the biggest portion — goes into the ground and then back out again in streams. Stricken creeks could spring back to life. Groundwater recharge gives farmers a strong incentive to do something that will help them, and help the local environment even more.
