This year, researchers found that the last 22 years were the driest consecutive years in the North American southwest in over a millennium. The pace and scale of climate change is forcing states and counties to adapt rapidly. In California, one of the industries at the forefront of the adaptation predicament is agriculture. In today’s episode, reporter Elena Neale-Sacks speaks with resilience researcher Amélie Gaudin, Sacramento Valley farmer Scott Park, and water policy research fellow Caity Peterson to understand how farmers and growers are, and aren’t, building resilience to drought.
Transcript
Noah: [00:00:09] So today we’re talking about an issue that hits kind of close to home for those of us born and raised in California: the drought.
Amy: [00:00:15] The state does have a bit of acclaimed fame for its drought.
Noah: [00:00:17] Unfortunately, it does. And I mean, the drought isn’t exactly new. There were multiple dry periods in the 19th and 20th centuries, and most of us probably learned about the Dust Bowl in history class.
Amy: [00:00:28] Right, but what’s new is the impact climate change has had on the severity and length of droughts in California. Research from this year found that the last 22 years were the driest consecutive years in the American Southwest in over a millennium. That’s wild.
Noah: [00:00:43] And one of the industries that’s been hardest hit by climate change and drought in particular is agriculture. Many of the methods farmers have used to grow food for the last century, like heavy irrigation and soil tilling, are no longer sustainable.
Amy: [00:00:56] In this episode, our reporter Elena Neale-Sacks dives into some of the practices that researchers and farmers are implementing to adapt California agriculture to our changing climate.
Noah: [00:01:04] This is Talk Policy To Me, and today we’re talking agriculture, drought, and resilience.
Amélie: [00:01:17] I’m Amélie Gaudin. I’m an associate professor of agroecology at UC Davis.
Elena: [00:01:23] I wanted to talk to Amélie because her lab at UC Davis focuses a lot on resilience in agriculture, with a focus on the role that soil plays. So what are some of the specific mechanisms for making agriculture more resilient to drought in California?
Amélie: [00:01:41] Building drought resilience in California involves building the capacity of our agricultural system to adapt to drought but also to become less vulnerable to drought. Some of the mechanisms on a smaller scale involve soil and soil ecosystems. The soil matrix can help cycle water in our ecosystem and conserve water in our ecosystems.
Elena: [00:02:09] Can you kind of walk through that a bit? Like how, you know, how does that work? How does soil help conserve water and preserve groundwater?
Amélie: [00:02:18] Soil as the medium that water flows through is very important for water to infiltrate through the soil rather than running off our fields. The second piece to this is soil carbon. Soil carbon and soil organic matter acts like a sponge in our soil and how breaching this water over the long term. At the biological scales, it’s increasingly shown that soil microbes can drive resilience of crops to drop, but also to other stress, which we know that climate change will bring multiple stresses at once.
Elena: [00:03:03] Something else Amélie brought up while we were talking is the use of cover crops to conserve water by creating healthier soil. A cover crop is basically a non-cash crop that can be grown with limited irrigation. Some examples are various grasses, clovers, and barley. What are some of the ways that cover crops benefit soil health or can benefit soil health?
Amélie: [00:03:28] So, cover crops are crops that we intentionally put in the system in between cash crop. They’re mostly grown in the winter and using winter precipitation for their growth. What do cover crop do in terms of water cycling is that they keep roots in the systems and enhance infiltration of winter precipitation and therefore some of the mechanisms for groundwater recharge. They keep the soil covered limiting runoffs, and they also are a source of organic material which build up organic matter levels, which will then eventually, over time, act as a sponge.
Elena: [00:04:18] I think some people kind of have this idea, like people who aren’t necessarily steeped in, you know, agroecology, maybe assume that, okay, say we’re in a bad drought, but then we get a few days of really heavy rain that that will kind of make a huge difference for our water storage and groundwater reserves. But that pretty heavily depends on the health of soil, right? Because like what you were talking about earlier, where–well–if it’s healthy soil, then it will like absorb a lot of that water. But if it’s not, then it’ll kind of end up just running off. Can you just kind of explain that a little bit?
Amélie: [00:04:56] Yeah, so how this soil really allows to take advantage of this large rain events that are going to be more and more prominent in the future. So we’re going to have more heavy showers, erratic weather events that we’re going to have to deal with. So cover crops and how the soil in general will allow this water to enter the soil ecosystems to support all the ecosystem services that our soil provide, including groundwater recharge.
Elena: [00:05:31] We talked obviously a lot about climate change adaptation, as you just mentioned, but you also brought up something last time about the potential of, you know, soil health and some of these other forms of resilience to actually help mitigate climate change as well. Could you talk about that a bit?
Amélie: [00:05:51] Yeah, and that’s one of the main cool benefits of thinking about soil and soil health as a mechanism for adaptation is that it helps with mitigating the problem in the first place. One of the largest sink for atmospheric carbon that we have in excess: our soil ecosystems. Soil ecosystem can store soil carbon, and this stored carbon is what helps build this soil capacity to adapt to climate change. So you’re having what we call a climate smart systems when you invest in your soil.
Elena: [00:06:26] I talked to someone else who has done exactly this–invested in soil. Amélie actually connected me with him.
Scott: [00:06:33] My name’s Scott Park, Park Farming Organics. I’ve been farming for 49 years and farming with a emphasis on soil health and organic really for the last 37 years.
Elena: [00:06:49] When did you have kind of a turning point or was it more gradual in kind of realizing like, we really need to pay attention to, you know, how we’re treating soil? Or was that always something that you like kind of realized?
Scott: [00:07:03] No, not at all. I’m first generation. I have zero roots in farming. I’ve got a Bachelor of Arts degree in political theory. So anyway, in 1974, that’s when I started farming. I was coming down here and working in the summers, and a fraternity brother got me a job on the farm. And so the farmer I was working with down here in the summers offered that I go into processing tomatoes with him and he’d give me, he’s flat broke of course, and he’d give me 20% of the net and all the beer and peanut butter sandwiches I needed to make it through the season, and it worked out. And we had, we actually had a very good year, and so that’s how I got into the farm world. In 1980, we amiably separated. Through those times, I didn’t have a clue what I was doing, but I was really good at watching other farmers, checking with the chemical companies on what to put on, and I got quite skilled at using every chemical possible to grow crops. Coming in to 1985, I was really starting to question the whole way that I was approaching farming, and I did not see the ground getting better and I saw our costs getting higher and higher. So in the fall of 1985, I picked up a field to put tomatoes in that I hadn’t farm before. It was pretty close to my other fields, very similar ground. And your question on was there a turning point, that was probably it–is I did. I had an epiphany in that I pulled in my big heavy caterpillars in giant rippers to loosen the ground up like I had to do on all my other ground and then the ground worked up beautifully with no load per say on the tractor, and it made me think, how are these farmers farming different than what I’m doing? And that was sort of the slap in the face. You know, they farm gentler. They got on the ground later in the spring. They never worked it wet. They had a nice rotation. And so it sort of made me, it made me realize I’m ruining on our ground. I’m making all my work harder. And it sounds corny, but even then I was thinking, whatever I’m doing, there’s not going to be anything for my kids.
Elena: [00:09:26] On top of realizing he had to farm in a more gentle way and not till so much, over time, Scott also started rotating crops more frequently.
Scott: [00:09:36] I mean, we’re growing up to 20 different crops. We’re growing fresh market, we’re growing rice, wheat, dry beans, corn. We grow a wide range of seed crops or, you know, like carrots or we grow like 25,000 tonnes of processing tomatoes. That’s probably the foundation of our system, but we try to come around once every three or four years as crop rotation is really important.
Elena: [00:10:02] I guess, what aspect or how has crop rotation been useful in just kind of the farm’s resilience overall?
Scott: [00:10:11] So our farm system is four C’s: compost, crop residue, cover crops, and crop rotation. And then the fifth C came in, and that was conservation tillage. So all of those are part of what makes this system work, and for the most part, if you pull out any one, your system’s not going to run as well. For example, let’s say you’re growing cover crops really good, positive, positive, positive. But then you go in and you just pound the cover crop to death with disks, you bury it deep, you turn all the soil over, you feel really good, but you just basically neutralized the benefit. You got the benefit of the cover crop. You just ruined it by over tillage. So cover crops are probably the foundation and then crop rotation is really critical in that we want to be bouncing back and forth and also on crop rotation. That’s not just diversity for the soil, but it’s also diversity for my pocketbook.
Elena: [00:11:11] These various resilience practices like cover crops, crop rotation, etc. have provided a cushion for Scott’s farm at times when other growers weren’t doing so well.
Scott: [00:11:22] Last October, we got the most rain we’ve ever got in one day, and we got six inches in 24 hours and there wasn’t a drop that left the field. As an example, a neighbor across the road on his ground who he tills heavily, he had topsoil running. So much water was leaving the field. Topsoil was running across the road in our field right next to his had no water leaving the field at all. Farmers have a tendency to think that if a thousand plants is good, put on 1500, you know, and if you need six inches to irrigate eight inches, you’re going to get a better, bigger crop and on and on with fertilizing and with cultivating. And we take the exact opposite. We try to do as little on the inputs and let, again, nature do its bit.
Elena: [00:12:14] I am curious like, how has your water use changed over time as you’ve kind of been paying more and more attention to, you know, some of these more or just implementing more of these resilient practices?
Scott: [00:12:28] Yeah, I would say we use less water, but I wouldn’t say it was significant, but it’s less. There’s no question it’s less. But it’s also some of it is a resiliency in the water holding capacity allows us to farm easier per se. And I’ll give you an example. So processing tomatoes, it’s like 120 day crop. Conventional farmers, most of it’s on drip now, they’re pretty much turning on the water just about when the crop or when the crop is planted, they sort of keep it on. They increase the amount. The frequency is the plants get bigger until they’re irrigating every day, and they’ll irrigate up to a week before tomato harvests, right? So for 120 days, they’re sort of irrigating almost a hundred. On our farm, when we planted tomatoes, we don’t do anything for 30 to 40 days, water wise. We trust the moisture in the soil and it promotes also a really good root system as the plants have to keep foraging and going and finding it. So we get nice deep root systems, but it also helps practically, not wetting the surface because then we of course know herbicides and then we have weed problems. So the longer we can hold off, the less weed problems we have. And on the other side of it, we can cut the water 40 days before harvest. Instead of irrigating 100 days, we’re irrigating 40 to 50, and that’s it. But the quality of the tomato, instead of a tomato water ball per se, is the water is just laying in there constantly. We have–our quality is excellent, and we’ve actually been able to keep markets instead of losing them because of the quality.
Elena: [00:14:20] Do you see your farm as kind of an anomaly in terms of your approach or do you, are you seeing other farms kind of implementing, you know, maybe this, these methods with soil and really kind of trusting? Are you seeing that elsewhere or like not…
Scott: [00:14:40] No.
Elena: [00:14:40] So much? No?
Scott: [00:14:42] No, and it’s fascinating just as a businessman. Like for myself, I’m taking in everything I can take in from anyone if I think there’s a way it can make the farm better. But conventional mindsets are pretty hard to budge. They’re comfortable in their world, they’re making money, and it’s a security thing. I don’t, I would say they are safely in a cocoon, okay. And there’s no–they don’t see a reason to take this risk.
Elena: [00:15:22] Yeah, I mean, do you think, I don’t know, part of, I feel like what I hear you saying is kind of a big part of the reason that your farm has been able to still like, to be economically resilient as well is you kind of built this up for the last, like, you know, three decades or more, like started implementing more resilient techniques. And so that took a long time. Like, it wasn’t like an overnight shift. I don’t know. Like, do you think it’s that part of it is daunting to, you know, especially maybe more large scale industrial operations, maybe.
Scott: [00:16:02] Yeah, getting people to move and change, yeah. It’s–you’re saying it took 30 years and that’s right. But for somebody like for my son and I, we’re transparent. We’re completely open. Anybody can come to the farm any time. We know that. There’s not one thing that we feel that we have the secret on. It’s all common sense and it’s all letting, respecting the power of Mother Nature. In fact, I just an hour ago was going through this with my son, and we also have major water problems like everyone else in the state this year. So, like, what field gets what crop and this and that. And then and so we’re losing some acres. We’re leaving acres out. We’ve never left an acre out before in 49 years. This is. Anyway, so he’s talking about playing field and I’m going, well you know, maybe it’d be good to give that a rest. And he’s still learning, you know, instant gratification. Boy, that price for tomatoes would be really good to plant this year. And I’m going, yeah, but you’re going to pay for it years down the road if you don’t kind of take it easy and don’t pound the soil, you know, that’s the example of, it’s just, everything we’re doing. We’re thinking, what’s the impact, not just this year and for our pocketbook, but what are we going to have down the road?
Elena: [00:17:27] The last person I spoke with for this episode is Caity Peterson, a research fellow and associate director at the Water Policy Center in the Public Policy Institute of California. She emphasized the importance of crafting policies that incentivize growers to adopt some of the practices Amélie and Scott talked about.
Caity: [00:17:46] Fundamentally, growers and people in the ag industry are trying to run a business, right? And rangeland, winter wheat, you know, we can’t mince words. There is really no way that those things can compete on an economic level with something like almonds, where your margins are a couple thousand dollars an acre as opposed to slim to no margins in the case of rangelands. So kind of as a standalone enterprise, it’s very difficult to make those things work, especially when your alternative is something like an orchard crop. So what’s the incentive going to be for a private landholder to do something like that as opposed to almonds? But that, that is to say, many people could find that their hands are forced because it might not be a question of almonds or wheat, it might be a question of wheat or nothing. Our baseline of comparison is quite important and it, for some people it might seem better to at least have some crop in the ground and maintain some kind of ag lifestyle and ag income as opposed to just abandoning land. Hard to say. There are different value systems operating there.
Elena: [00:19:02] Sure. Well, it’s interesting because that conversation, I feel like, is very similar to just conversations about adapting to climate change more generally, because, you know, so often when we’re talking about the financial aspect of it, yeah, the comparison is like, oh, it costs so much money to account for like sea-level rise and stuff. Like that’s too much money compared to not doing it. But then it’s like you’re not taking into account, like it’s going to happen. Homes will be submerged. So what like the cost of not doing it, you know, is going to be so much higher and…
Caity: [00:19:38] Yeah.
Elena: [00:19:38] So I yeah, I feel like that’s an interesting comparison. And I mean, obviously this is all related.
Caity: [00:19:47] It is. And it’s all very relevant, and I can sort of feel that terrain shifting a little bit when it comes to Central Valley agriculture, because a lot of people are very resistant to the idea of our ag industry changing, of kind of proactively taking things out of production and so forth. And in that’s understandable I feel like, you know, it’s, it’s people’s livelihoods we’re not talking about. It’s very easy for us sitting here in our studios and offices to say, why don’t we just not do ag there? But I do also feel like despite this resistance, a lot of people in the ag industry, and especially right now with these, with drought coming after drought and how, just how brutal that’s been for agriculture on top of all these other stressors, a lot of people, I feel like, are seeing the writing on the wall and are, you know, they’re having to make difficult decisions no matter what. So it’s a question of do we make those difficult decisions and bite the bullet now, or we do it in 20 years when we absolutely have to. And there’s no other option.
Elena: [00:21:09] Yeah. Well, I’m curious, where does like the state and potentially federal government play into this? I’m thinking like potentially subsidies or something that would financially incentivize growers to, like, start these transitions sooner rather than later. Like, has there been much of that or is there hesitance even on the part of like governments to do that? What are you seeing in that realm?
Caity: [00:21:35] Well, I mean, I think the biggest step we’ve taken in that direction is more on the regulatory side of things. And that’s where the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act comes into play. Right, so groundwater in the state of California is basically our biggest drought reserve. And what happens when we have a drought like we’ve had in the last two years where our surface water sources, you know, so that’s water that’s coming from melt water in the Sierras, from snow in the Sierras, in our rivers and streams when that surface water is limited, many people turn to groundwater and groundwater pumping to make up the difference. And the reason the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act, or SGMA, as it’s known came into being is because we’d been mismanaging those groundwater resources for many, many years, for decades, really.
Elena: [00:22:34] SGMA was passed in 2014 and it basically requires counties throughout the state to make plans to reduce their groundwater use substantially by 2040. Some of Caity’s work has focused on potential ways to do this.
Caity: [00:22:48] There are a couple alternatives that the Water Policy Center that we’ve been looking into in more depth, and one of them is solar energy development that has a lot of potential in the San Joaquin Valley. And that’s one of those where there is income-earning potential for that. So there are some constraints concerning connectivity to the electrical grid and all that that have to be considered, but there’s income potential there. Repurposing land towards habitat and restoring habitat in the valley is something folks are also very interested in, but that’s another one that’s very, it’s hard for it to pay for itself, right? So that’s something where public programs could make a difference. And then fallowing and transitions to different types of ag are also on the table, right? So public programs could include strategic fallowing programs, right, where you’re actually paying farmers to fallow a piece of land instead of growing a crop in a particular season, and that’s a way to manage demand, particularly for groundwater during dry times. And there’s also repurposing away from irrigated ag towards ag that requires a lot less, a lot less irrigation. So that could be something like winter. Winter crops that are able to utilize at least some winter precipitation.
Elena: [00:24:19] Basically cover crops.
Caity: [00:24:20] Assuming we get good winter precipitation, maybe still need a little bit of irrigation, but dramatically less than, say, a summer crop or an orchard.
Elena: [00:24:33] Yeah, I mean, so it sounds like and I know I included kind of a question about like what are the, what’s the source of most of the barriers to making these changes? And it, it sounds like it’s kind of mostly economic with I mean, would you agree with that?
Caity: [00:24:52] Yeah, I think that the economic question is big because, as I said, agriculture is fundamentally a business, and if the numbers don’t pencil out, then it’s hard to just say, well, you should just plant wheat because we don’t have enough water. You know, a lot of farmers might be more inclined just to, you know, abandon that land and not do anything with it or sell to a larger grower or corporate grower or something like that. And a lot of these alternatives to irrigated ag that we’ve been talking about don’t do a very good job of paying for themselves. So there need to be incentives for those the benefits that you would get from those alternatives, the benefits they would bring beyond their monetary value. What say they might be different kinds of benefits that the that we’re interested in from the standpoint of the public good, right? I do think logistics tie in quite a lot from that. So the scale and cost of production for alternative, more water, limited winter appropriate crops is really important. The know how the equipment. And it’s also social. I mean, agriculture is very deep in the psyche in many places in the valley. People’s identity is tied up in rice farming, for example, or almonds, for example. So and so people value that, that way of life that comes with farming and are reluctant to see that landscape change and convert to whole scale industrial solar, for example. And that’s sort of a cultural change that just kind of takes a little bit longer, right? I think that policies like SGMA are pushing in the right direction, but will, will have to do more to kind of push past some of those barriers.
Elena: [00:26:27] My sense is SGMA is kind of a bit of a like if we’re talking in like carrots and sticks, it’s a little bit of a stick because it’s like, all right, it’s a, you know, regulation. It’s okay. You simply must adhere to these groundwater-use limits. Do you think it’s necessary to have, I don’t know, a complementary carrot policy to kind of serve as that side of the incentives?
Caity: [00:26:56] Yeah, I think I think that is always a good idea. So SGMA is more of the stick policy, right? And then allowing for programs like, a good example would be the Department of Conservation’s Multibenefit Land Repurposing Program, which is sort of a step towards more of a carrot, right. So that program’s providing block grants for different actors in the valley to implement land repurposing projects. So that’s a good example of an incentive and payments to fallow, payments to plant cover crops. Those types of things would also be more of a carrot. And another thing that we haven’t talked about yet, but that I think would be really helpful in this new age of groundwater and drought and so forth, is, you know, it’s not necessarily one policy, but policies that facilitate water trading and water banking would also be really helpful, and that would involve improving access to water-use information because we can’t really have a good market without measurements, without allocations. And we know that if we have transparent groundwater markets and surface water trading, that we can significantly reduce the economic impacts of drought. So that’s kind of an example of where you’re just creating avenues where it may be easier and more profitable for a grower to sell their water to somebody who wants it more. And it’s kind of like a market solution in that way rather than a regulatory solution. There are tradeoffs, of course. There are like, there are downsides that have to be mitigated for with that kind of thing too, you know, like, for example, what happens to waterbird habitat and migratory bird habitat if every rice farmer in the Sacramento Valley sells their water south somewhere? You know, it’s not, you know, it’s like a winners take all policy but it’s always more complicated than it seems.
Caity: [00:29:04] Our team has come up with the rough figure of about 500,000 acres of irrigated ag and in the San Joaquin Valley only that would likely need to come out of production if we’re going to meet the goals of SGMA, and that’s about 10% of our irrigated ag footprint. So that’s a lot of land to deal with. So yeah, it’s going to take a coordinated effort not only from state and federal agencies, but from all of the stakeholders and actors in the Valley. [00:29:40][36.4]
Amy: [00:29:46] So Noah, what are your takeaways?
Noah: [00:29:47] What stood out most me was Caity Peterson’s comments towards the end about regulating groundwater reserves. It speaks to the need for greater regulation when it comes to water conservation in the state. As someone who was born and raised in California, it’s not difficult to see the immediate effects of the drought on our daily lives. Just last week, the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California required about 6 million people to cut their outdoor watering to one day a week as a result of the drought. The reason Caity’s comments stand out is because it seems like there’s already a good amount of regulation in this space, but the magnitude of the problem points to a need for even more regulation or other policy interventions at least. It makes me wonder what we’ll see coming down the pipeline to regulate water usage and curb the effects of the drought in the future.
Amy: [00:30:31] Yeah, I think overall my takeaway was really pulling back and thinking about how California has seen horrendous fires, Texas is literally frozen, and now India is experiencing record-breaking deadly heat waves. It’s just never been more obvious that climate change isn’t just coming, it’s here. Policy is stalled at the federal level, so we have to look to the states to protect our land and to compel industries like agriculture to shift from old identity driven and corporate fueled farming to more sustainable practices.
Noah: [00:31:00] Amy, this is a special occasion, because it’s our last episode as co-hosts.
Amy: [00:31:15] It is. It’s so sad.
Noah: [00:31:17] I know. I know I had a great time working with you, Sarah, Bora, Elena, and the entire Talk Policy To Me throughout the last year.
Amy: [00:31:25] Absolutely. I feel really honored to have been able to co-host this with you, and just looking back and thinking about the span of all the different episodes that we’ve done, it’s really helped me get a better understanding of how policy can really drive our social issues, and I’m proud to have been a megaphone for that.
Noah: [00:31:42] Yeah, and we were able to really cover a lot of ground from tech to agriculture to race and issues of gender-based violence. I feel like we were able to expand our policy knowledge and hopefully teach our listeners a few new things about policy as well.
Amy: [00:31:59] Definitely. So while this is the last episode for us, it’s definitely not the last episode for Talk Policy To Me. You all will have two new co-hosts come in over your podcast waves next year, and I’ll look forward to hearing what they have to say.
Noah: [00:32:13] Thanks for listening. This has been a wrap on Talk Policy To Me: Season five. Y’all have a great summer.
Amy: [00:32:19] Talk Policy To Me is a co-production of UC Berkeley’s Goldman School of Public Policy and the Berkeley Institute for Young Americans.
Noah: [00:32:31] Our executive producers are Bora Lee Reed and Sarah Swanbeck.
Amy: [00:32:35] Elena Neale-Sacks produced and engineered this episode.
Noah: [00:32:38] The music you heard today is by Blue Dot sessions and Pat Messiti Miller.
Amy: [00:32:43] I’m Amy Benziger.
Noah: [00:32:44] And I’m Noah Cole.
Amy: [00:32:45] Catch you next time.
Noah: [00:32:46] Can’t say next time this time.
