Agriculture Archives

IID Begins Second Wave of Sheltering Employees at Work

May 19, 2020/in Home Headline, Media Coverage, San Diego County /by Mike Lee /NBC Palm Springsby Taylor Martinez

Imperial Irrigation District, California’s third largest public power provider and the largest irrigation district in the nation, will be extending its voluntary on-site shelter-in-place program at designated critical facilities for a core group of employees.

To keep employees safe and to ensure that the district’s water and energy systems remain operational during the COVID-19 pandemic, 32 district employees have been living and working at their job sites since April 25.

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7 Things You Can Do Now to Support San Diego Farms, Food Economy

May 19, 2020/in Colorado River Basin, Home Headline, Media Coverage, San Diego County /by Mike Lee /Times of San Diegoby Hoa Quach

The San Diego Food System Alliance is calling on San Diego County leaders and residents to recognize the devastating impact COVID-19 is having on our local food system—including food businesses, farms and fisheries, food and farm workers, and food security.

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Complex Dynamics of Water Shortages Highlighted in Study

May 19, 2020/in California and the U.S., Home Headline, Media Coverage /by Mike Lee /Cornell Chronicleby Syl Kacapyr

Within the Colorado River basin, management laws dictate how water is allocated to farms, businesses and homes. Those laws, along with changing climate patterns and demand for water, form a complex dynamic that has made it difficult to predict who will be hardest hit by drought.

Cornell engineers have used advanced modeling to simulate more than 1 million potential futures – a technique known as scenario discovery – to assess how stakeholders who rely on the Colorado River might be uniquely affected by changes in climate and demand as a result of management practices and other factors.

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Looming Drought Concerns Arizona Water Group

May 19, 2020/in California and the U.S., Home Headline, Media Coverage /by Mike Lee /Western FarmPressby Lee Allen

The Agribusiness and Water Council of Arizona likes to say it represents Arizona agriculture “from ditch bank to dinner plate” indicative of the fact that its members range from farmers and ranchers to irrigation groups and trade associations — all of them concerned about water flow along the 1,450-mile-long Colorado River.

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More San Diego Shoppers Getting Items Direct from the Farm

May 18, 2020/in Home Headline, Media Coverage, San Diego County /by Kimberlyn Velasquez /The San Diego Union Tribuneby Karen Pearlman

San Diego County residents who are trying to avoid grocery stores during the coronavirus pandemic can find a lot of their food needs met through a bountiful supply from local farmers, ranchers and other vendors.

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Trump’s Water Jurisdiction Rule: What’s All the Fighting About?

May 18, 2020/in California and the U.S., Media Coverage /by Kimberlyn Velasquez /Bloomberg Lawby Ellen Gilmer

The Trump administration’s long-anticipated water jurisdiction rule has already drawn a half-dozen legal challenges since its April release, with more on the way.

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Judge Temporarily Blocks Trump’s California Water Plan

May 12, 2020/in California and the U.S., Home Headline, Media Coverage /by Kimberlyn Velasquez /AP News

A federal court on Tuesday temporarily blocked the Trump administration’s efforts to pump more water to the agricultural Central Valley, which critics said would threaten endangered species and salmon runs.

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Opinion: Here’s How Less than 10% of Farmland Could Solve the Colorado River’s Water Deficit

May 12, 2020/in California and the U.S., Home Headline, Media Coverage /by Kimberlyn Velasquez /Arizona Centralby Bruce Babbitt

It is no exaggeration to say that a mega-drought not seen in 500 years has descended on the seven Colorado River Basin states: Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, New Mexico, Nevada, Arizona and California. That’s what the science shows, and that’s what the region faces.

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New Federal Clean Water Rule Puts Expensive Onus on Colorado

May 12, 2020/in California and the U.S., Home Headline, Media Coverage /by Mike Lee /The Gazette (Colorado Springs, Colo.)by Jerd Smith

Colorado and other Western states will be hard-pressed to shield their rivers and streams under a new federal Clean Water Act rule finalized last month, largely because hundreds of shallow Western rivers are no longer protected, and writing new state laws and finding the cash to fill the regulatory gap will likely take years, officials said.

Though many agricultural interests and water utilities support the new Waters of the U.S. rule, as it is known, Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser and Patrick Pfaltzgraff, director of the state’s Water Quality Control Division, said they will take legal action to protect streams that are no longer subject to federal oversight.

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Farmers, Ranchers Dispute Legal Limits of Revamped Water Rule

May 12, 2020/in California and the U.S., Media Coverage /by Kimberlyn Velasquez /Bloomberg Lawby Amena H. Saiyid

Cattlemen in the West are gearing up for a legal battle over the Trump administration’s revamped water jurisdiction rule, even as a national trade association of farmers that touts itself as the “unified voice of agriculture” supports the change.

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