Desert Lettuce: Inefficient Water Use at Its Finest

Roseland speaks in Chapter Five about the environmental and economic impacts of the current water consumption habits in North America. Not only does overuse of the current water supply create a burden on a limited resource, but it only encourages further environmental disruption and economic strain through the building of new dams and energy sources to pump more water from less accessible locations.

Roseland took an optimistic route in this chapter by showing us examples of things local governments and grassroots organizations are doing to decrease water consumption and to more effectively clean water for reuse. All this talk about efficient water use, however, got me thinking about an example of the government enabling inefficient water use: the large-scale production of water-thirsty crops in the Southwest. We learned about this issue in Economics class last year, and it really has stuck with me.

Despite the water shortages in the cities of states such as California and Arizona, farmers are using obscene amounts of water to grow crops such as lettuce, rice, and cotton. Some of the crops even require the fields to be flooded (what genius thought desert rice paddies were a great idea?). Why would farmers engage in these activities when the hot sun and arid climate rapidly evaporate the water? It is all made possible by the government. Huge federal subsidies make water much, much cheaper to farmers than to residents of cities. The government defends this practice by saying that the farms create much-needed jobs and food.

According to a 2009 article in The Arizona Daily Star, agriculture in California uses 80% of their federally-controlled surface water each year, and the farmers pay less than half of what a city does. The same article states that over a two-year period, the government handed out $687 million in subsidies to hundreds of farmers in Arizona and California (article does not clarify whether the money was entirely for water subsidies). Roseland eludes to the fact that that this type of system would create irresponsible use of water since the farmers do not know the true value of what they use. He says (sourcing NRTEE and Pinkham & Davis) that studies show that raising the cost of water and imposing user pay rates encourages conservation.

The World Wildlife Fund campaigns against wasteful water use in agriculture. Their website states that "inefficient food production and harmful agriculture subsidies are causing deforestation, water shortages and pollution." They go on to say that agriculture wastes 60% the water used for the industry each year. They list the main causes as being:

• leaky irrigation systems
• wasteful field application methods
• pollution by agri-chemicals
• cultivation of thirsty crops not suited to the environment

The last one, of course, is what I am highlighting in this blog post. Roseland has stressed in several places in both this chapter and the previous one that it is very important to plant vegetation that is drought resistant and/or native to the ecosystem. The government should encourage farmers in desert areas to plant crops which will require much less water or to give up farming these lands all together (an option which may not be economically feasible). This would save the government money, save the citizens money, allow more of the water to be directed to cities (where water-saving programs should also be in place), and lessen the strain on the Earth's freshwater resources.

Desert lettuce has got to go.