Some San Diego Farmers Shut Off Water In Prolonged Drought

Our top story on Midday Edition -- Governor Brown is working to get $1 billion in emergency drought relief okay in the state legislature. And much of that money will go toward a two struggling farmers and farm communities in the Central Valley. But what about growers in San Diego county? How do they intend to manage to get through a fourth year of drought? Joining me is Eric Larson executive director of the San Diego Farm Bureau. Good to see you. Thanks for coming in. ________________________________________ Thank you. ________________________________________ Can you remind us so we have a basis point how big is San Diego's agriculture industry? ________________________________________ It's about $1.8 million a year. That's the value of the farmers receiving for the crop so that's a considerable number. It's in the top 19 -- top 20 counties in the United States. We have a significant agricultural Company -- economy. Speak -- ________________________________________ How many farms? ________________________________________ A lot of them are small. A lot of them do it part time but they are adding to the local farm economy. ________________________________________ Give us an idea of the range of products grown. ________________________________________ There are the avocados. What's the top crop in San Diego county and people will say avocado because we are really connected with that. But the number one crop is ornamental plants. We are really a big producer of nursery plants -- nurseries are number one and avocado is number two. We do a lot of cut flowers and women's. Eggs in a variety of other crops. ________________________________________ We become aware in recent years that there is actually cattle in San Diego county. ________________________________________ You have to go and fight it. It's out in the backcountry so you have to head out to Julian but we've got 200,000 acres in this county dedicated to cattle grazing. There are a lot of cows. ________________________________________ In the last few years we talked about with the lack of winter rains in the price of water has been doing to some growers. Some fields have been abandoned. Give us an overall situation now. ________________________________________ You talked about the cattle ranchers so we will start that. Those cattle ranchers and that 200,000 acres -- that land is not irrigated. They depend completely on winter rains to grow the grass to sustain their cows and for those cows to have calves and to raise them through the spring and summer until they are ready for sale. It's been very difficult for them during the strike years because there is not a lot of feed out there. You have to buy supplemental feed or thin the herd's. The economic choice has been to thin the herd's. The other growers who irrigate in San Diego county had the problem for them it is not a lack of water like in other parts of the state. We have water. But it's very expensive. When they normally would not be buying water in December in January and February -- it hasn't rained so they have to buy water and that cost comes off the bottom line. ________________________________________ For all the non-farmers listening to us when it doesn't rain during the wintertime it means that the farmers have to continue to. Eight -- irrigate in Bywater. ________________________________________ Our farmers are hooked up to the municipal water system. Exactly what the residential users are hooked up to. They have to buy it in the winter when they would much rather not. ________________________________________ How much more is it costing to irrigate? ________________________________________ The price of water has doubled in the last six years. We know why. The county water authority in the Metropolitan water District have done a good job and -- of investing in supply and storage an alternate supplies. Those of us in San Diego county in Southern California we've really not suffered like the rest of the state or parts of the state because that water system is so secure. But it's expensive to secure the water system. Farmers of had to take their lumps on that and paid the higher price. ________________________________________ Can you give us an idea or an example of what that's done to some farmers bottom lines? Has it made them go from having a profitable business to one that's not sustainable? ________________________________________ We call the permanent crop growers -- for the most part in this county those who grow citrus and avocados. They got a tree in the ground that they have to maintain. They really can't skip a year or reduce the size of the crop. Those have to be maintained. The cost of water can be as much as 70% of their overhead. Imagine 70% of your expenses doubled in a period of five or six years. It has created a situation where unfortunately about 10,000 acres of avocados have been walked away from. It is still there land but they've decided to turn the water meter off. It just wasn't profitable anymore. It was costing more to irrigate the make it hope to return in the price. ________________________________________ I'm speaking with Eric Larson and he is president of the -- executive director of the San Diego Farm Bureau. So what kind of ripple effect does that have on the region's economy when you have formally profitable farms were farms that used to generate a lot more in product then they are doing now because they either have to thin out their herds or turn off the water and let some of their trees die? ________________________________________ What happens is there is the direct from economy and then the economy that surrounds the farmers and those are the folks who are creating the supplies that the farmers need to buy. Folks that are packaging it and getting it to market. Transportation and fuel. Everything that goes into producing and getting a product to market. If a product -- farmer is producing less they are less involved in that surrounding market so pure dollars are going to that other part of the economy. As I mentioned its $1.8 billion is what the farmers receive that it's probably more than double that the value to the local economy when all of those products are bought. If there's any reduction in farming there will be a reduction in those other uses as well. ________________________________________ In the beginning I said that there is this big drought emergency relief package that's being proposed in Sacramento. $1 billion. A lot of that is going towards the Central Valley because those are farming communities where they have some of them have almost completely run out of water so they are in desperate straits. Do you expect to see any of that state emergency money helping here? ________________________________________ I think it's interesting that they labeled it as emergency money. A lot of it is just directing bond money that we've already approved as voters. Bonds from several years ago and proposition one last year. A lot of it is just saying we are now going to spend these -- this money. In the Central Valley some of that money is going to trickle down to food banks to help unemployed farmworkers and such. We don't expect to see any of that money come directly to farmers in San Diego county but some of that money may help to find recycling water, additional desalination and maybe some efficiency programs for water districts. That does help the farmers as well. ________________________________________ And when you talk about farmworkers with fewer crops being maintained in San Diego county that would probably mean the need for fewer farmworkers. ________________________________________ In a normal year I certainly would agree with that statement. We've had a farm worker shortage here. We've been trying to deal with that and some farmers have had a difficulty getting their crops to market in a timely manner because there haven't been a farmworkers here in the county. That's a whole other issue on immigration reform that we could talk about another day. I don't think we will see substantial unemployment. Other things are happening also. Farmers are changing crops and growing techniques. I think our labor demand will stay fairly stable. ________________________________________ Before we go into that because I want to talk about the change in crops and growing techniques but besides the concern about the lack of rainfall there's also concerned about the states decreasing groundwater supply. How much to San Diego growers depend on wells and ground water for irrigation? ________________________________________ Quite a few but it's never been quantified. If I would guess I would say 20% of our agriculture depends on groundwater. If you go to those communities you will see they are very heavily planted with crops. They are very dependent. To this point and I should add Borrego Springs to that because that is in San Diego county. They have an overdraft problem so they are dealing with that what those other areas the San Luis Ray Valley. Those aquifers seem to be holding up and not having the dire drop in the depth of the aquifer like they are seeing in the San Joaquin value -- Valley. ________________________________________ So they are holding on pretty well. ________________________________________ Except for Borrego Springs. That's it -- a desert area. They are pulling more water out of the ground that is recharging each year from natural info to the groundwater basin. The amount of water continues to reduce which means you have to pump from a deeper depth. ________________________________________ I also want to ask you -- you mentioned that the San Diego county water authority has been diversifying. Not getting so much of its water imported from the Metropolitan water District from Northern California. They are making forays into desalination. Recycling is going on in the city of San Diego. The water transfer deal FROM THE IMPERIAL VALLEY. ALL OUR DIFFERENT WATER SOURCES FOR SAN DIEGO COUNTY FAIR HOW MUCH OF THAT HAS ACTUALLY HELPED SAN DIEGO GROWERS? ________________________________________ IT ALL HELPS THE GROWERS. IN OTHER PARTS OF THE STATE THERE'S NO WATER. SO THOSE AREAS ARE DEPENDENT ON A SINGLE OR TWO WATER SUPPLIES. BY DIVERSIFYING THE PORTFOLIO DONE HERE THE AUTHORITY -- AND WE ALL SHOULD SEGMENT -- SEND THEM A THANK YOU NOTE. WE DON'T APPRECIATE THE AMOUNT OF WORK THAT WAS DONE. BY DOING THAT THEY'VE INCREASED THE AMOUNT OF WATER AVAILABLE HERE. IT'S HARD TO SAY HOW MUCH IS A DIRECT BENEFIT TO FARMERS THAT NONETHELESS WE HAVEN'T HAD A SITUATION DESPITE THESE TWO YEARS OF DROUGHT WHERE FARMERS HAVE HAD TO MAKE MANDATORY CUTS IN THE WATER THEY HAVE. THE FARMERS HAVE HAD ACCESS TO WATER. IT'S EXPENSIVE BUT THEY HAVE HAD ACCESS ALL THIS TIME. THAT COULD CHANGE IN THE NEXT SEVERAL MONTHS. FOR NOW IT'S BEEN VERY GOOD. ________________________________________ AND JUST A WORD ABOUT THE IMPERIAL VALLEY. THE FARMERS IN THAT COUNTY ARE IN A DIFFERENT SITUATION BECAUSE OF THEIR WATER WHITE -- WRITES FROM THE COLORADO RIVER. ________________________________________ THEY ARE CALLED A FIRST POSITION. THEY ARE GOING TO GET THEIR COLORADO RIVER WATER EVEN BEFORE WE GET HOURS. THEY ARE DOING VERY WELL OUT THERE. AND THEY ARE DOING A GOOD JOB OF TAKING CARE OF THAT WATER SUPPLY AND THEY DO A GOOD EFFICIENT USE OF THE WATER THEY HAVE. THEY ARE IN A PROTECTIVE POSITION. ________________________________________ LAST YEAR WE SPOKE WITH SOME GROWERS ON THIS PROGRAM WHO WERE CHANGING THEIR CROPS FROM CITRUS TO WINE GRAPES. IS THAT A TREND THAT'S HAPPENING IN SAN DIEGO? ________________________________________ I'M NOT READY TO SAY IT'S A TREND OR TRENDING BUT IT'S OUT THERE. AND GROWERS ARE DEFINITELY LOOKING AT IT. IT'S NOT JUST CHANGING CROPS TO SOMETHING THAT IS LOWER WATER -- USES LOWER WATER LIKE GRAPES OR DRAGON FRUIT OR OLIVES. FARMERS ARE LOOKING AT THAT. IF WHAT THEY ARE DOING IS UNPROFITABLE THEY OWE IT TO THEMSELVES TO WHAT. IT'S NOT JUST CHANGING TO A LOWER WATER USE CROP. MAYBE IT'S CHANGING THE WAY THEY GROW THAT CRAP THAT THEY HAVE TO PRODUCE MORE TONNAGE PER ACRE. IF YOU -- IF THE WATER IS EXPENSIVE CAN THEY PRODUCE MORE FOR EVERY UNIT OF WATER THEY APPLY TO THAT CRAP? ________________________________________ CAN YOU GIVE US AN EXAMPLE OF HOW THEY MAY DO THAT? ________________________________________ ITCHING -- THE TECHNIQUE IS CALLED DENSE PLANTING. TRADITIONAL FOR PLANTING AVOCADOS HAS BEEN 100 TREES PER ACRE. OVER A PERIOD OF TIME THEY GROW INTO EACH OTHER IN THE GROW VERY TALL AND YOU DON'T HAVE TO MANAGE THE TREES. A NEW STRATEGY THAT'S BEING STUDIED IS TO PLANT 400 TREES PER ACRE. FOUR TIMES THE NUMBER OF TREES. YOU'RE NOT PUTTING ON A LOT MORE WATER PER ACRE BUT NOW YOU HAVE FOUR TIMES AS MANY TREES. THE ISSUE BECOMES HOW DO YOU MANAGE THAT CANOPY? AVOCADO TREES ARE VERY AGGRESSIVE GROWERS. THEY WILL HAVE TO DO SOMETHING THEY HAVEN'T DONE BEFORE AND DO A LOT OF PRUNING AND MANAGING OF THOSE TREES. IF THAT WORKS THE AMOUNT OF AVOCADOS THEY CAN PRODUCE PER ACRE MIGHT BE SIGNIFICANTLY MORE. ________________________________________ YOU KNOW THAT THERE HAS BEEN AN AWFUL LOT OF TALK ABOUT THE DROUGHT IN CALIFORNIA IN SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA AND HOW IT AFFECTS RESIDENTIAL AND HOW IT AFFECTS BUSINESS COMMUNITIES AND SO FORTH. DO YOU THINK THERE'S BEEN ENOUGH ATTENTION PAID TO HOW THE ONGOING DROUGHT IS ACTUALLY AFFECTING THE REGION'S GROWERS? ________________________________________ I WISH THERE WAS MORE BUT I ALWAYS THINK I WOULD LIKE THE WHOLE REGION TO PAY MORE ATTENTION TO FARMERS REGARDLESS OF THE ISSUE. BUT FARMERS ARE AN IMPORTANT PART OF THE ECONOMY AND I THINK MOST SAN DIEGO AND IS -- WOULD AGREE IT'S NICE TO HAVE LOCAL FOOD AND NURSERY PRODUCT. AND IF WE ARE GOING TO HAVE THAT WE HAVE TO HAVE THE WATER SUPPLY. THE FARMERS REALLY AREN'T THE ONES WHO ARE PUTTING THESE DEMANDS ON THE SYSTEM. 50% LESS WATER IN THE COUNTY AND WE WERE 10 YEARS AGO. YOU CAN'T SAY THAT FOR THE RESIDENTIAL SIDE. WE HAVE REDUCED OR USAGE BY 50% IN A VERY SHORT PERIOD OF TIME AND WE'RE ONLY CONSUMING MAYBE 10% OR LESS THAN 10% OF THE WATER IN MAKING THIS SIGNIFICANT CONTRIBUTION TO THE LOCAL ECONOMY AND ENVIRONMENT. IT DOESN'T TAKE MUCH OF A SACRIFICE ON THE URBAN SIDE AND BEING EFFICIENT AND IRRIGATING IN CREATING ENOUGH WATER TO SUSTAIN THE FARMERS. WE WOULD LIKE TO SEE THAT RELATIONSHIP BECOME A LITTLE MORE VISIBLE. ________________________________________ I WANT TO THANK YOU SO MUCH. I'VE BEEN SPEAKING WITH ERIC LARSON EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF THE SAN DIEGO, BUREAU. TAKES YOUR TIME. ________________________________________ THANK YOU.