Sacramento-California’s ongoing drought fueled wildfires near Santa Barbara and in parts of southeastern Arizona last week, and also produced additional actions at the state and federal level to aid water deliveries in agricultural areas already facing drastic cutbacks. Snow surveys taken by state officials in late April confirmed only 66 percent of average snowpack in the Sierra, compared with 72 percent at this time last year. Water storage at prominent state reservoirs also underscored the severity of the drought – Lake Oroville stood at 58 percent of average in early May, Shasta at 66 percent, New Melones at 53 percent, San Luis Reservoir at 39 percent, and Folsom at 81 percent of average. Hundreds of thousands of acres of cropland will be directly affected by cuts in water deliveries to the west side of the San Joaquin Valley this year, primarily within the San Luis Delta Mendota Water Authority and Westlands Water District. Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar announced in late April that the federal government had cleared the way for water transfers among various sources through California’s Drought Water Bank. Also in late April, the Bureau of Reclamation announced that farmers in the Central Valley Project would receive 10 percent of their contracted water deliveries, an increase from the zero allocation that had earlier been announced, but still equivalent to less than 2.5 inches of water per acre of farm ground in the region, according to local reports. On April 24, the San Luis Delta Mendota Water Authority and Westlands Water District jointly filed a motion for preliminary injunction against the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service seeking to prevent additional water cutbacks. The district produces about $1 billion in crops annually, and estimates that the water shortages have so far resulted in some 300,000 acres of lettuce, tomatoes, and other crops remaining unplanted.
Transparency Across the Fertilizer Value-Chain