UC Davis Study - California Drought Could Eliminate 80,000 More Ag. Jobs This Year Alone - SJMN

[hatrack]

The farmers who will be slammed the hardest are those who depend on the Central Valley Project, the massive federal system of dams, reservoirs, pumps and canals that helped spawn California's $36 billion farming industry — the state's largest. Within a couple of years, Coburn says, numerous small towns like Firebaugh could die and hundreds of thousands of once-profitable acres could turn into fields of dust. Beginning today, the federal water spigot in California has been turned off for the first time. And just as in "Armageddon,'' the game might be over.

Across the Central Valley, warns a new University of California-Davis study, 80,000 jobs could be lost this year. In Firebaugh, a historic town of 7,000, one of the first casualties could be the Silver Creek Almond Co., which Coburn co-founded five years ago to pack and market the almonds he grows on 1,500 acres.

All of the water used to nourish Coburn's orchards comes from the Central Valley Project. And on Feb. 20, federal water officials announced a "zero allocation'' to farmers — most likely for the rest of the year. Farmers who depend on water from the State Water Project are only slightly luckier — they have been told their allocation will be 15 percent of normal.

"In a few years this will all be gone,'' Coburn predicted as he walked through a cavernous warehouse stacked with bins containing 10 million pounds of almonds, about 70 percent of which will be sent overseas. "Think of the business that will be lost at the Port of Oakland,'' Coburn said. "This is all going toward reducing our trade deficit.''

EDIT

http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_11803992?source=most_viewed

[madrchsod]

1. they left the dust bowl and moved to the land of milk and honey

now several generations later their descendent's face another..

[moundsview]

2. Is the point of this study

that a man made eco-system to turn the desert into farm land is unsustainable? I don't think that the Almond trees being grown are native to the area are they? Probably a case of too many people making demands on a naturally limited supple of water.

[jwirr]

3. Those 80,000 jobs are also jobs that are not likely to come back in

that location. I would suspect that most of the produce raised on these California farms will be grown somewhere in the midwest from now on. But that means drastic change and water is only one part of the problem - global warming also brings hot weather and new pests to these areas not to mention the energy needs that will become in short supply in the future. The best idea is still localize.

[Tumbulu]

4. the almonds replaced a whole lot of cotton

that was a real low income producer per acre crop. The farmers used lots of ag chemicals to grow it and so, IMO the trees are a much better crop. Almonds use much less water than cotton, plus most of them are irrigated with drip systems. All better. And not that many ag chemicals are used, compared to cotton, that is.