Lots of rain, but little water. This is the title of a recently published article about the major storms that hit California last December. And it is that despite the fact that California received the intense rains that it so badly needed, as indicated in the article, it was not enough to save it from the severe drought that the region faces. On the other hand, California’s main reservoirs remain below average for this time of year.
The Colorado River’s river system, which supplies not only California but six other western states as well, sits even lower, with one of the lakes feeding the river at its lowest level in a century. In addition, 64% of the state’s groundwater wells are also below normal.
But the problem is not just the lack of rain. California’s water problems are primarily due to the vast extent and rapid growth of industrial vegetable, nut, and dairy production, primarily for export to the rest of the country. Large dairies and other large-scale industrial farms also use enormous amounts of water. This production relies on irrigation water, which is largely drawn from California groundwater.
The dramatic consequences of dwindling water
The area planted with almond trees (great consumers of water), for example, has almost doubled in the last decade. Scientists have calculated that since 2019, the rate of groundwater depletion has exceeded by nearly a third that of the last two droughts on record. As Tom Philpott states in his excellent book Dangerous Reward“Basically, the farms we depend on to supply our grocery aisles have become so starved for water that, even accounting for the wet years, they consistently overrun California’s modest water resources.”.
This decline in groundwater levels in California has a number of dramatic consequences. In 2022, more than 1,400 dry wells were reported in said entity, the highest figure since 2013, the year in which said data began to be recorded. In this way, those who want to continue using groundwater will have to dig deeper. But not only that.
In certain areas of California’s Central Valley, aquifer depletion is causing the ground to sink, this is because the space resulting from lowering water table levels is causing layers of gravel, sand and clay to collapse. This, in turn, permanently reduces the water storage capacity of the aquifer.
In some parts of the valley, the land has receded at a rate of 30 centimeters per year, which has damaged canals and wells. Thus, as the soil sinks and compacts, it loses its ability to store water, making it unsuitable for agriculture.
Not only in California there is a lot of rain and little water
But groundwater depletion isn’t just a problem in California. It is a problem in many of the major irrigated agricultural areas around the world. according to a to studyBetween 1960 and 2000, the global area affected by groundwater depletion more than doubled and has accelerated since then.
Other researchers estimate that a third of the world’s major aquifers are at risk. According to Jay Famiglietti, co-author of this study “alarmingly, more than half of the world’s largest aquifers are being depleted. They have passed sustainability tipping points and a third of them (thirteen) are seriously threatened”.
“Virtual water” and threatened aquifers
According to the same study, two of the most densely populated regions in the world, northern India and northern China, are experiencing high levels of groundwater depletion. Three cases stand out: the aquifers of the Ganges River and the Indus basin (both in India) and the aquifer of northern China. As in other parts of the world, the main cause is the excessive use of water for irrigation, while climate change aggravates the situation.
In the Punjab region of India, the epicenter of the Green Revolution, peasants saw groundwater levels drop by up to 1 meter a year, forcing them, in recent years, to build their wells more than 60 meters deep. The graphic below illustrates the incredible overexploitation of the world’s groundwater over the last century.
Water Consumption and the Green Revolution
Between 1950 and 1980, the global area under irrigation doubled and has continued to grow rapidly ever since. One of the main factors behind this tremendous increase was the Green Revolution, which spread new water-intensive varieties of wheat, rice and maize around the world. But it was also a period when, under pressure from the World Bank, the IMF and other international organizations, the countries of the Global South began to orient their crops towards export.
Many of them need large amounts of water to grow. For example, corn needs 500 to 900 millimeters of water per crop, cotton needs 700 to 1,300, while crops like sugar cane and banana need 1,200 to 2,500! no less than 15,000 liters of water!
When talking about commercialization of agricultural products, it has become common to express it in terms of importing and exporting “virtual water”. Despite this, water is rarely taken into account in food import and export decisions. For example, in terms of the total water needed to produce rice, India, Thailand, Pakistan and Vietnam are the biggest exporters of virtual water. However, peasant women and men and women in many of these countries face serious problems due to the decrease in the levels of available water, as well as the increasing difficulties in accessing it. If these countries continue to export their “virtual water” at the current rate, they may run out of water to continue exporting, or worse, to produce enough rice to feed their own population.
Environmental impact, the Doñana nature reserve
Another aspect to consider when we talk about the excessive use of water for irrigation purposes is the impact on the surrounding natural areas. The case of the nature reserve of Donana, in southern Spain is a good example of this. Doñana is the largest wetland in Europe, with more than 100,000 hectares of lagoons and marshes, where hundreds of thousands of migratory birds rest annually. Unfortunately, in recent decades, the area around the reserve has witnessed a huge expansion of strawberry and blueberry cultivation.
Between 1982 and 2000, the area devoted to strawberry cultivation grew sixfold, currently reaching around 6,000 hectares of greenhouse cultivation. Also being one of the driest regions in Europe, agriculture is highly dependent on water drawn from underground aquifers, so this increase in agricultural production is drying up the Doñana reserve, threatening the wetland ecosystem and the birds that depend on it. Today, it is possible that the surroundings of the reserve are the main strawberry producing region in Europe and the largest exporter in the world. However, with its water resources rapidly depleting, it is unlikely to stay that way for much longer.
Almería Greenhouses
A few hundred kilometers to the east are Almeria’s gigantic complexes of greenhouses, which supply most of Europe’s winter vegetables. Its 40,000 hectares of greenhouses are a veritable “sea of plastic”, making it the largest area of greenhouses in the world. And although it is one of the driest regions in Europe, its greenhouses consume between 4 and 5 times more water than the annual rainfall. To reach groundwater, deep wells had to be dug, which supply 80% of the water used in agriculture.
But aquifers are not just being depleted, they are also being degraded. A dramatic increase in both groundwater salinity levels (caused by seawater ingress, a common process in overexploited coastal aquifers) and nitrate concentrations (a product of fertilizer use), has raised alarm bells due to the danger they pose. represent for local biodiversity and the quality of drinking water. Again, many wonder how long the miracle of Almeria vegetables will last.
Fossil water, non-renewable water deposits
Other countries rely on so-called “fossil water” – groundwater that has remained sealed in an aquifer for thousands or even millions of years. As these deposits are not replenished naturally, these waters are considered non-renewable. One such country is Saudi Arabia.
From the installation of mobile sprinkler irrigation systems (center pivot irrigation systems), and taking advantage of the ancient fossil waters found under the sand, in the mid-1980s, this country embarked on an ambitious agricultural project with the aim of being able to cultivate in the desert and arid basin of Wadi As-Sirhan, in the northwest of the country.
The Saudi desert had about 500 billion cubic meters of fossil water and about 21 billion cubic meters a year have been extracted in recent years to support this modern type of intensive agriculture. As a result, one study calculated that 80% of this fossil water would have disappeared long ago.
Fetching water outside one’s own territory
It is for this last reason that Saudi Arabia began to look for agricultural land outside its borders, mainly in Africa, and thus import food back into the country. This process has contributed to the massive grabbing of global farmland, which has driven farmers and pastoralists off their land in Africa and the rest of the world.
Saudi Arabia is not the only country in the Arabian Peninsula looking for land with access to water in other parts of the world where it can establish its large-scale agricultural production, even in places like Sudan, where access to water is already an issue. A recently released documentary called the clawshows how access to water for food production is today a geopolitical and national security issue.
Hunting water for agriculture
In general, the current demand for water for agriculture finds its justification in the increasingly irregular rainfall caused by climate change. But that water has to come from somewhere, so using that water for agricultural irrigation will mean taking water from lakes, reservoirs and aquifers, which could exacerbate water conflicts, already exacerbated by climate change, and lead to the much-talked about water wars. .
It is clear that we cannot continue with this irrational use of water to irrigate crops for export. If we do, the world will literally run out of water. The time has come to support and encourage the use of local agricultural techniques, much more sustainable, implemented by small farmers around the world, who with their careful system of crop rotation, cover crops and intercropping save water and keep the soil fertile. It is essential to implement public policies that promote food sovereignty and that aim to feed people and not line the pockets of food importing and exporting companies.
