Opinion | Our farmers need our help - The Washington Post

The searingly honest March 30 news article about the California drought, “In its third year, California’s drought strangles farming,” painted a brutal and accurate portrait of what’s happening to farmers and farm communities. The article focused mostly on California’s Central Valley, but it’s worth pointing out that the entire West is in a similar situation. Eighty percent of our country’s fruits, nuts and vegetables are grown west of the Rockies.

That means that if nothing is done, the devastation being experienced in the farm community will soon be felt by all Americans at the grocery store. With all the global insecurity, this is a terrible time to create food insecurity at home. And yet that is exactly what we’re doing.

As noted in the article, by doing nothing, the government is making a choice to strangle farming, and that is likely not what most Americans want.

Without support for Western farming, we are abandoning a safe, diverse, affordable food supply that will force more imports and higher prices on top of current inflation.

The government needs to make farming a priority by balancing various water uses. By the time the grocery stores are empty, it will be too late.

Mike Wade, Sacramento

The writer is executive director of the California Farm Water Coalition.

The incisive article on the impacts of California’s drought accurately captured the dire situation now facing San Joaquin Valley growers and farmworker communities. But a bigger, more nuanced story needs to be told.

Agriculture in the valley is industrial in scale, dominated by large corporate entities and predicated on control of state and federal project water. San Joaquin agribusiness is not a forlorn victim. It is a prime mover in the current tragedy.

Agriculture — primarily industrial agriculture — uses 80 percent of California’s developed water while contributing about 2 percent to the state’s economy. And much of that water is used on “impaired” lands in the San Joaquin Valley.

Western San Joaquin Valley soils are heavily laced with toxic selenium. Farmers irrigate their crops with state and federal project water delivered from the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. This water is slightly brackish, and salt accumulates around the root zone of irrigated crops through the course of each growing season. This salt must be periodically flushed with more project water, taking both salt and selenium with it. The resulting “drain water” subsequently flows down the San Joaquin River and back to the delta, imperiling fish and wildlife.

Water is a public trust resource. It ultimately belongs to the people, not a handful of powerful agribusiness magnates. More dams won’t solve California’s water crisis, but taking impaired lands out of production and reforming state water policy will.

Carolee Krieger, Santa Barbara, Calif.

The writer is executive director of the California Water Impact Network.

Adblock test (Why?)

"Opinion" - Google News
April 01, 2022 at 11:14PM
https://ift.tt/KVHbehd

Opinion | Our farmers need our help - The Washington Post
"Opinion" - Google News
https://ift.tt/tuyK6rh
Shoes Man Tutorial
Pos News Update
Meme Update
Korean Entertainment News
Japan News Update