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Imperial Valley district plans to reline canal to prevent Seepage (LA Times, May 6): MEXICALI, Mexico -- Farmer Bernardo Gonzalez has tilled the Mexicali Valley for more than half a century, but he says he's never had a harvest as bitter as the one he fears he'll reap soon: crops withered by their loss of precious Colorado River water. The leathery but still agile 82-year-old is caught in the currents of an international water dispute that could leave him and 2,500 other Mexican farmers in Baja California high and dry, one of an increasing number of conflicts that characterize U.S.-Mexico border water policy. "We're afraid of what might happen," said Gonzalez, who has worked his 45 acres since 1937, when Mexican President Lazaro Cardenas gave him expropriated land. "This is one of the most valuable farms around here. But it won't be if they put cement in the canal." He's referring to the All-American Canal, which since 1944 has transported water from the Colorado River westward into California's Imperial Valley, helping turn a desolate and arid wasteland into a $l-billion- a-year farm economy. The canal's operator, the Imperial Irrigation District, says it will soon begin a project to reline a porous 23-mile section of the canal, converting it from clay to concrete. That would save the vast amounts of water lost to seepage but would devastate Gonzalez and the other farmers who have come to depend on it for ground water. The Mexican government isn't taking the plan lying down. Mexican authorities, from Baja Gov. Eugenio Elorduy to Cabinet members, have complained to the U.S. government to stop the project, so far to no avail. Mexico says it violates a 1944 water accord that calls on the United States to consult with Mexico on any project that affects water supplies. The State Department and an international body meant to settle water disputes between the U.S. and Mexico have said California is legally entitled to line the canal. And whereas officials in California are unwilling to back down from the lining project, they have discussed the possibility of "good faith" projects on the U.S. side of the border to increase the quantity and quality of Colorado River water that Mexico gets. The stakes are high. Seepage totaling as much as 2% of all the transported from the Colorado River to the Imperial Valley has prosperity to the northeast Mexicali Valley, which is what the is called south of the border. Losing it would create economic, environmental problems, Baja officials warn. water brought Imperial Valley social and "We are concerned with any possibility of significant reduction of what we recelve from the Colorado River," Mexican Foreign Minister Jorge Castaneda said Friday. "That's where we get our water from." Castaneda's advisor on binational water issues, Ambassador Alberto Szekely, said in an interview this week that Mexico is about to step up the pressure to have the project stopped or changed. 54