Agency Acknowledges Enhanced Delta Flows Won’t Harm Agriculture
From the California Water Impact Network:
Despite receiving the lion’s share of water from the massive state and federal projects that pump from the Sacramento/San Joaquin Delta, Central Valley corporate growers have long complained that the enhanced flows needed to maintain essential ecosystems and valuable fisheries amount to “water wasted to the sea.”
They insist they need every drop of available water, and that any reduction in their allocations will result in food scarcity and economic catastrophe.
But a draft report from the State Water Resources Control Board undercuts this specious argument. Among the findings in a recently released 6,000-page environmental assessment of the San Francisco Bay/ Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta estuary are data on the impacts to agriculture resulting from different flow regimes. The conclusion: even under the scenarios that provide the greatest river flows, the consequences for Central Valley agribusiness will be minor.
“These findings document what many people have long suspected,” said Max Gomberg, a senior policy analyst for the California Water Impact Network (C-WIN). “The Delta and its supporting rivers can be restored without significant impacts to agricultural production.”
Currently, agribusiness receives about 80% of California’s developed water, and much of that water is used to grow nuts, rice, animal feed, and grapes.
“Providing more water for the rivers would reduce some corporate profits, but it would not impact food security,” said Gomberg. He notes the Water Board’s report shows reductions in those crops, but the total projected reductions in agricultural revenues are less than 10%, and less than 5% under some scenarios.
The Water Board analyzed agricultural revenues at different river flow levels, with and without additional groundwater pumping, and under drought and non-drought conditions. Even in the scenario with the greatest water use constraints on agriculture – 75% unimpaired river flow, no additional groundwater pumping, and drought conditions – the net revenue decline for Sacramento Valley and Delta agriculture is 9.8%. For the San Joaquin Valley, the net revenue decline would be only 4.6%. In wetter years, the revenue reductions would be minimal.
Carolee Krieger, C-WIN’s executive director, said Gomberg’s findings highlight the Board’s unwillingness or inability to establish fair and equitable water policy.
“In the same report, the Board acknowledged that California’s water rights claims exceed the actual supply by more than five times,” said Krieger. “This overallocation of our water resources lies at the heart of the crisis. Even though corporate growers already take most of our water, and even though reallocation would affect their bottom lines minimally, they lobby for more water – and the Board and the Newsom administration tacitly support them.”
Gomberg said the data confirms “It is time to reject the false narrative of farms versus fish. The actual decision in front of the Water Board is between allowing agribusinesses to maximize profits and providing some equity to everyone who stands to benefit from river restoration– small farmers, tribes, Delta communities, Trinity River communities, commercial and recreational fishers, urban ratepayers, and every Californian who values healthy rivers. If the Newsom administration cared about the public good, this would be an easy decision.”
To review the State Water Resources Control Board’s data on crop impacts, go to Chapter Eight of the Water Board staff report (Supplemental Environmental Document), available at: https://www.waterboards.
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