California almond grower Bob Weimer inspects trees in his orchard. The $6.5 billion crop has claimed the spotlight as the poster child of all things bad in water in California.Rich Pedroncelli/The Associated Press
And to think, just a few years ago, working for the California Almond Board was probably a relatively boring job.
As the most important agricultural state in America struggles through the fourth year of a historic drought, California has started to turn on itself. The state's government has imposed sweeping, mandatory water usage restrictions, and some cities and municipalities have started handing out steep fines for overuse.
In a part of the world where water, relatively speaking, costs very little, such attempts to fundamentally alter the way Californians think about their most vital resource have caused serious friction. Indeed, some measures, such as tiered usage metres that charge lower rates to people who use less water, have had their constitutionality challenged in court.
But nothing comes close to matching the antagonism building over the industry that accounts for more than three-quarters of California's water usage: agriculture.
Following Governor Jerry Brown's decision this month to impose the first mandatory water usage restrictions in California's history, many critics were quick to point out that the rules focused overwhelmingly on residential users. As such, it is up to California's 400 or so local water supply bodies to figure out how to meet the Governor's demand for 25 per cent usage cuts – not the state's $45-billion agriculture industry.
More than half the country's fruits, vegetables and nuts come from California, including the vast majority of lemons, oranges, artichokes, kiwis, carrots – the list goes on. But the backlash against farm-based water usage has not been divided equally among those crops. One, in particular, has received far more criticism: almonds.
California is responsible for essentially all of the almond supply in the United States. In the past decade, the state's almond industry has quadrupled, becoming a $5-billion-a-year business. That growth has come largely as a result of soaring demand from China.
But almonds also require a massive amount of water. By one account, it takes about 1900 gallons of water per pound to grow them. By comparison, beef – considered the poster boy for water-intensive agriculture – requires some 1800 gallons per pound. (The comparison is far from ideal, given the vast ecosystem of crops required to support a cattle-growing operation). "California's Almonds Suck as Much Water Annually as Los Angeles Uses in Three Years," screamed a recent headline in Mother Jones magazine.
In response, the state's almond growers – led by the California Almond Board – are fighting back with a public-relations blitz designed to shake off the "alarming untruth" that almond growers use 10 per cent of California's water. In fact, the industry group says, almonds use only 8 per cent of the agricultural water, disproportionately less than the 12 per cent of the state's irrigated farmland that they take up.
The bizarre back and forth between the industry and its critics is indicative of something larger – the dawning fracture lines between California's myriad water users, as that water becomes a more and more limited commodity. Of these fault lines, the most significant is being drawn between the state's residential users and its farmers.
There are several reasons why Gov. Brown spared farmers from the brunt of the recent water restrictions. For one thing, even though the industry accounts for only about 2 per cent of California's Gross Domestic Product, agriculture is a politically powerful force in the state. California's farmers have also already been hit hard by a massive reduction in available surface water – a direct result of the drought. The state also has no means of accurately gauging farmers' groundwater usage – there exist no standard metres like those in residential areas. Thanks in part to agricultural industry lobbying, a law that would allow for measurement of that groundwater use won't be implemented until 2022.
(There is also another, fairly straightforward reason to go easy on California's farmers: they grow the food the rest of the country eats).
But there's no reason to believe the state won't be forced to take a much tougher stance in the future if the water supply continues to dwindle. Currently, snow levels in the Sierra Nevada are hovering at about 5 per cent of normal – the lowest levels since records were first collected more than 60 years ago. Signs that the drought is breaking are few.
In truth, wiping the entire almond industry off California's map would – like almost every other conservation measure, taken individually – go a very short way toward fixing the state's existential water crisis. As far as single-item solutions go, it would probably do far more good to, for example, abolish the highly inefficient practice of flood irrigation, which is still used by many California farmers. Or for everyone to stop eating beef.
But what the state requires is something far more overarching: a concerted, unified effort by virtually every stakeholder. But as the drought's effects intensify, the almond backlash suggests that, before any such coming-together takes place, there will be no shortage of infighting.