California drought brings smaller harvests, more hunger among farmworkers [San Jose Mercury News]
These
are the human faces of the diminished winter harvests: Manuel Avila, Jorge
Rivera, Adriana Garcia, Jessica Yanez, Salud Santacruz and more than 17,000
others who confront hunger due to reduced hours or lost jobs in food picking,
processing and packing….Under sodden gray skies, the 2014 drought feels far
away, but its effect is just now being felt in the reduced agricultural yields
of the southern Central Valley. With an estimated 420,000 to 700,000 acres of
irrigated cropland pulled out of production this summer, the state expects
losses of $810 million in crop revenue and $203 million in dairy and livestock
value, as well as $453 million in added costs due to additional well-pumping,
based on NASA space satellite imagery and an economic analysis by Josué
Medellín-Azuara and colleagues at the UC Davis Center for Watershed Sciences.
Although that lost acreage is only 5 percent of the state's total agriculture,
it hits hard in the towns in Tulare Lake Basin -- among the poorest in the
state. "There are pockets of real pain and suffering," said the
report's lead author Richard Howitt, a UC Davis professor emeritus of
agricultural and resource economics.
Farmers
brace for labor shortage under new policy [Associated Press]
Farmers
already scrambling to find workers in California — the nation's leading grower
of fruits, vegetables and nuts — fear an even greater labor shortage under
President Barack Obama's executive action to block some 5 million people from
deportation…."This action isn't going to bring new workers to
agriculture," said Jason Resnick, vice president and general counsel of
the powerful trade association Western Growers. "It's possible that
because of this action, agriculture will lose workers without any mechanism to
bring in new workers."…"Hopefully there will be the opportunity for
comprehensive immigration reform," said Karen Ross, secretary of the
California Department of Food and Agriculture. "That's the right thing to
do for this country."
Egg
prices likely to rise amid laws mandating cage-free henhouses [Los Angeles
Times]
If
your eggs seem a little pricier, consider the recent changes on Frank
Hilliker's ranch. In the last six months, the third-generation egg farmer in
central San Diego County has reduced his flock by half and embarked on a
$1-million overhaul of his henhouses to make them more spacious. Customers are now
paying about 50% more for a dozen eggs from Hilliker's family business at
around $3 a carton. It's all to comply with a landmark animal welfare law that
takes effect in California on New Year's Day. Voters overwhelmingly approved
Proposition 2 in 2008 to effectively abolish the close confinement of farm
animals in cramped cages and crates — a practice that animal advocates say
causes needless suffering and boosts the likelihood of salmonella
contamination….But to ensure the well-being of California's 15 million laying
hens, consumers will probably have to pay more for the supermarket staple.
Prices for wholesale eggs are expected to rise 10% to 40% next year because of
infrastructure upgrades and the reduction of flocks to provide animals more
space, according to Dan Sumner, an agricultural economist at UC Davis.
California
carbon funds are an uncertain benefit for high-speed rail [Sacramento Bee]
Even
before the funding was approved, several infrastructure development firms wrote
letters expressing interest, encouraged by the prospect of cap and trade. Yet
as rail officials began talking with potential investors about cap and trade in
recent months, the funding source has proved not only to be alluring, but also
problematic. The Brown administration projected generating about $550 million
from cap-and-trade auctions in the current fiscal year, but the Department of
Finance refuses to estimate future revenue, arguing doing so might influence
the market. For investors looking for a reliable return, the uncertainty of
future proceeds is concerning. “Cap and trade is a potential good solution, but
it’s still not quite certain,” said Michael Liikala, a consultant who advises
foreign companies on infrastructure projects in the United States and who has
been involved in high-speed rail talks. “It’s like if you went to the bank for
a mortgage and promised to give them 25 percent of your income, but you didn’t
know what the income would be.”
Lost
California rangeland is said to pose greenhouse gas risk [Sacramento Bee]
A
comprehensive inventory of Central Valley, Sierra foothills and Central Coast
rangelands between 1984 and 2008 found that almost half a million acres of
rangeland has vanished from California’s landscape. The disappearance of
rangelands – the large and open lands synonymous with the West – will make it
harder for the state to reach its greenhouse gas emissions goals and may
imperil endangered species, scientists say. State pollution regulators are now
looking at whether rangelands should be included in California’s cap-and-trade
program, which allows businesses to offset their carbon emissions by investing
in natural landscapes that trap carbon – such as forests.
Drought
brought permanent changes to California water policy in 2014 [San Gabriel
Valley Tribune]
California’s
prolonged drought left an indelible mark on state water policy and homeowners
alike in 2014. For the first time in the raucous history of water in
California, regulation of groundwater basins was approved, the state Water
Resources Control Board gave local cities the power to hand out $500 fines to
over users, and thousands of planet-conscious homeowners transformed their
green lawns into desert landscapes. In short, even if winter rains continue at
what has been an above-normal clip and the story for 2015 is a busted drought,
the behavioral and regulatory changes from the four-year drought may be
permanent.
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