The Value Of Good Water Management

View From The West water project

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Farmers wear many hats to do their jobs, and one of their most important hats is their business hat. Growers need to pay close attention to production costs and determine where money can be saved. They also need to reinvest in their operations to improve productivity and income. While most farmers would agree that water management is important for crop production, the cost of water is often small relative to the cost of other inputs, such as energy, land, and labor. For producers of high-value vegetables, which are sensitive to moisture stress, it makes business sense to apply extra water to assure maximum production.

In the upcoming years, vegetable growers may not have the luxury of using as much water as they are presently using. Water has always been considered a valuable commodity in the west, but changes in supply and demand will likely increase water costs.

The combination of more frequent droughts and diversion of water for environmental purposes has limited the total supply of surface water. Populations in cities and suburbs continue to grow and are increasingly competing with agriculture for water resources. In some agricultural regions where ground water is the main water source, over-extraction of aquifers has led to declines in water tables’ levels and intrusion of seawater into wells.

On California’s Central Coast, growers are now paying assessments for developing projects to bring recharge and pumping into parity. These projects include building new infrastructure for capturing surface water run-off and recycling urban waste water for re-use in agriculture.

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Environmental Concerns

Besides increases in water costs, environmental consequences of agricultural irrigation may also affect growers’ bottom lines. Farmers in California face significant costs to comply with new water quality regulations to reduce nitrate leaching and surface water pollutants. Improving irrigation management will be critical to addressing water quality impairments.

In addition to water quality regulations, produce buyers are increasingly pressuring growers to implement more sustainable practices in their operations. Water management is a key to using fertilizer nutrients such as nitrogen efficiently and for protecting water quality. Sustainability audits will likely include reviews of growers’ water management practices.

Considering that water costs may trend higher as water becomes more scarce and that the environmental effects of irrigation will also need to be minimized, many growers have already come to the conclusion that investing in irrigation makes business sense. In the Salinas Valley, the use of drip irrigation for vegetable production has steadily trended upward.

More than half of the vegetable acres are now irrigated with surface drip. While most of the drip acres are for lettuce production, an increasing number of acres of cole crops are also being produced under drip.

In the Central Valley where surface water allocations can be limited during drought years, drip has allowed growers to farm more acres with less water. Besides saving water, drip provides more management options for growers. Under drip, tractor operations are less likely to be hampered by saturated furrows and application uniformity under drip is not affected by wind, which is common in the afternoon along the coast. Additionally, drip can reduce foliar disease pressure in crops by keeping leaves dry.

Although vegetable growers have made significant progress in using water efficiently by converting acreage to drip, additional steps can be taken to improve irrigation management. These include using irrigation consultants to provide professional advice on irrigation system design and management, and investing in trainings for irrigators and foremen.

In addition, new tools for monitoring soil moisture, climate, and water use may help growers better customize irrigation schedules to the needs of their crops. Finally, more water efficient and salt-tolerant vegetable varieties will be needed to maintain good production when water becomes more limited.

Water management is critical for raising high-quality vegetables. As water becomes more scarce and expensive, investing in improving water management will probably be a wise business decision. 

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