Central Sacramento County Groundwater Forum

 

Agriculture Interest Group

 

Background

 

A fundamental challenge facing agriculture, not only in Sacramento County but also across the country, is that agriculture’s contribution to the community is not fully understood or appreciated by the general public. People may comprehend agriculture’s role in putting food on the table. Some may even recognize that agriculture contributes to our “quality of life”. But few people grasp the extent and complexity of the benefits that agriculture provides. When we speak of agriculture’s contribution to our community and to our quality of life, we are talking about such things as:

 

• FOOD PRODUCTION. The water used by agriculture produces food for people. In addition to water used for bathing, drinking, etc., each Californian “eats” more than 4,500 gallons per day in the food they consume. (Source: California Farm Bureau Federation)

 

• INCREASED PRODUCTIVITY. Farmers in California work efficiently, producing more than half the nation’s fruits, vegetables and nuts from 3% of the nation’s farmland. Since 1980, agriculture’s share of water in California has remained constant, but farmers have increased production in tonnage by 67% during the same period. As a result, consumers in Sacramento County, as in the rest of the state, spend less than 11% of their income on food. (It should be noted that this increase in productivity is attributable, in part, to technological advances. It is also driven by necessity as farmers have had to find ways to produce more in order to maintain a reasonable standard of living in the face of a steadily declining profit margin.)

 

• INNOVATION IN USE OF AGRICULTURAL BY-PRODUCTS. Take the walnuts and rice that are grown in Sacramento County as examples. Walnut shells and almond hulls help generate electricity at co-generation power plants. Walnut shells are also used as an ingredient in the abrasives used to clean tiles on the space shuttle and are made into roofing materials. Rice hulls are used for urban yard composting.

 

• ECONOMIC VITALITY. Sacramento County farmers and ranchers produce more than seventy-five different agricultural commodities. The gross value of agricultural production in Sacramento County in 2000 was $286,000,000, a significant contribution to the over-all economic vitality of the area.
• OPEN SPACE AND HABITAT PRESERVATION. Agricultural lands enhance the environment of Sacramento County and provide habitat for approximately 75% of the area’s wildlife. For example, the nearly 8000 thousand acres in the Sacramento County that are planted in rice provide nesting habitat for migratory waterfowl, while both waterfowl and raptors nest and hunt in the 7600 acres used to grow alfalfa. 

 

• GROUNDWATER RECHARGE. Farmers use water efficiently, reusing and recycling it within their own agricultural operations and returning a significant portion of that water to the groundwater basin through deep percolation.

 

Yet, in spite of these benefits, the plain truth is that agriculture in Sacramento County is at risk. Between 1988 and 1998, 21,800 acres were converted from agricultural use to development. An additional 5500 acres of farmland have now been included within the city limits of Elk Grove. While a number of factors may be contributing to the decline in agricultural acreage, the pressure of increasing urbanization is clearly one of them.

 

Issues and interests

 

In light of these facts, what are agriculture’s issues and interests?

 

• AN ADEQUATE AND RELIABLE WATER SUPPLY.

 

Water is the lifeblood of agriculture. No water, no agriculture, no food. It’s that simple.

 

• AN ADEQUATE AND RELIABLE WATER SUPPLY AVAILABLE AT AN ECONOMICAL COST.

 

Agriculture in central Sacramento County is almost completely dependent on groundwater. As long as this remains true, it means that we need to protect the resource. Therefore, a major concern is stabilization of groundwater levels. Further decline in water levels will result in increased cost to pump water. These costs are already high. For example, in the central area of the County during the month of May, it cost $2700 to pump water for 200 acres of irrigated pasture/hay and $9000 for 1500 acres planted in row crops, orchard and vineyard. These costs will increase as the summer progresses. Substantial long-term increases in pumping costs because of further decline in water levels will either drive land out of production or farmers out of business or both. 

 

• RECOGNITION THAT FARMERS ARE CONSTRAINED BY FOOD PROCESSORS AND BY U.S. AND FOREIGN MARKETS AND CANNOT PASS ON COSTS TO CONSUMERS AS OTHER BUSINESSES MAY BE ABLE TO DO.

 

Farmers face competition for market share from other areas of the state, the nation and the world. This fact, combined with the way agricultural products are marketed, leads to economic constraints within which a farmer must operate. Unlike an M & I water purveyor, a farmer cannot pass on costs to his customers.  As an example, if a farmer has to pay a 10% surcharge for fuel to the truck company taking his crop to market (as has happened recently), that surcharge cannot be passed on to consumers because the crop has already been sold at an agreed upon contract price.

 

• ACTION TO PROTECT GROUNDWATER FROM POTENTIAL CONTAMINATION AND MITIGATE THE CONSEQUENCES OF SUCH CONTAMINATION IF IT DOES OCCUR.

 

If an agricultural well has to be shut down because of contamination, there is currently no alternative supply to which the farmer can connect. And you can’t irrigate 100 acres or raise 500 head of cattle on bottled water. If a farmer has to turn off his well, either for a limited period or permanently, the farmer must be made whole.

 

• COMPREHENSIVE WATER PLANNING SO AS TO ENSURE AN ADEQUATE SUPPLY FOR ALL ANTICIPATED DEMANDS.

 

Agriculture is not going to want to give up water simply in order to promote urban growth. So we need to look at the totality of the resource and determine how it can be used more efficiently. We must think about ways to create a bigger pie, not just fight over how to cut up the existing pie. For example, can more be done to clean up current contamination and then put that water to beneficial use in this community and not just ship it off down the river?

 

• CREATIVITY AND WILLINGNESS TO CONSIDER ALL OPTIONS.

 

There are a lot of things that could be done to address the problem of an adequate long-term water supply: groundwater recharge, greater emphasis on conservation (both agricultural and urban), acquisition and distribution of surface water, consideration of more surface storage, utilization of underground storage capabilities, greater use of recycled water, etc. Nobody is going to like all the options. But we need to find a combination of things that will work.