8009 ‎(2)‎

• UCREFRP Catalog Number: 8009
• Author: Natural Resources Law Center.
• Title: Restoring the Waters.
• USFW Year: 1997.
• USFW - Doc Type: Boulder, CO.
• Copyright Material: YES

AGRICULTURAL WATER CONSERVATION
Agriculture uses over 80% of the devel-
oped water supply in California and a
similarly large percentage in other western
states. The federal government heavily
subsidizes the cost of delivering much of
this water.
By providing farmers with cheap water,
irrigation subsidies have encouraged
inefficient irrigation practices as well as
inefficient patterns of water use in the
western United States, including produc-
tion of water-intensive crops in acid
regions, such as irrigated pasture, alfalfa
and rice.
Irrigation subsidies also foster agricultural
production on marginal lands in the West
where cultivation requires excessive use of
chemicals or where agricultural drainage
problems can harm the environment.
Irrigation of these marginal lands contrib-
utes to the degradation of rivers and
streams as well as to the contamination of
aquifers, the destruction of wetlands and
the poisoning of fish and wildlife due to
polluted runoff and agricultural drainage.
The disaster at Kesterson National Wildlife
Refuge in California is just one example of
the impacts of this agricultural pollution.
At Kesterson, selenium-laden agricultural
drainage from the Westlands Water
District led to widespread deaths and
deformities among the waterfowl popula-
tion and the eventual closure of the
wildlife refuge. Recent studies have shown
that agricultural runoff and irrigation
drainage continue to pose threats to fish
and wildlife.
51
~'
Elements of agricultural water
conservation
^ Increase irrigation efficiency
^ Shift to less water-intensive crops
^ Retire marginal farmland from
production