“I’m a firm believer that the ag industry and ag producers are at a critical point. The river’s at a critical point. We need ag producer voices loud and at the table.” - Andy Mueller COVER STORY
So, in times of shortage, it will be argued by city dwellers that cities can water green spaces and people can water their lawns before agriculture can irrigate hay fields and crops. And that won’t change. “Even for those of us who are advocates for agricultural water use, the idea of cutting water off to cities and people who depend on water in their taps or water in their fire hydrants is politically untenable for any state engineer, any governor, any judge. So there’s that municipal preference.” What’s more, Mueller says municipal planners and municipal water system operators look at irrigated agriculture in the Colorado River Basin as a reservoir for future growth.“And they have approached it various ways; many of them through buy and dry,” where a developer buys water rights from a farmer or rancher. Mueller uses Southern California as an example.“The biggest [municipal water provider] is the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California. They have utilized the purchase or fallowing of agricultural land in the Palo Verde Irrigation District. And they are looking at and have made some deals with the Imperial Irrigation District, as has San Diego, to either permanently or temporarily fallow ag land to provide water for urban use.”
run risk by not doing anything?” he asks. Further,“Is it appropriate to have a program developed within the Colorado River Basin, both the Upper Basin and the Lower Basin, where we’re focusing on trying to keep the most productive ground in irrigation production?” Without those kind of options coming from ag producers, Mueller fears the war will rage on, where it turns into an us-vs.-them situation and municipalities continue buying and drying. “I’m a firm believer that the ag industry and ag producers are at a critical point. The river’s at a critical point. We need ag producer voices loud and at the table.” If ag producers and their associations can do that, Mueller believes the conversation can productively find solutions that will help. “And if we can’t do that, I’m afraid that the paid consultants for the urban water-use lobby will find solutions that will result in the downfall of ag in our state and in the basin as a whole.”
to less water-intensive forage, hay and pasture plants. And to make some hard, voluntary choices when irrigation water is short. Every ag operation has land that is more productive than others. Because a producer is interested in the success of the operation, it’s likely that water will be used on the more productive land, while less productive land doesn’t get irrigated. If that’s the way producers work on an individual basis, do you scale that up and develop a CRP-type of program where producers are paid to take marginal land out of irrigation? Or do you do nothing and let ag producers with senior water rights get the water while producers with junior rights get nothing and municipalities get water from ag producers with senior rights? In Mueller’s mind, doing nothing isn’t an option. “I think the question for agriculture is, does ag come to the table, stay at the table and protect its interests by understanding we
AG AT THE TABLE
So it’s absolutely critical in Mueller’s mind that agriculture has a strong voice at the negotiation table. Beyond that, what can be done? One is for ag producers to switch
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