Mandatory Saving Water Restrictions

California farmers are among the most efficient users of water in the country, despite accusations by The Times and others. Two recent independent studies each showed that overall Central Valley agriculture is 99% efficient in its use of water. An acre of homes consumes about the same amount of water as the average acre of farmland. And farmers are not the end users of this water. It takes over 1.5 million gallons of water to grow the food for one person for one year.

Comparing agricultural and urban water costs is misleading. Agriculture water costs less for several reasons. One important reason is that farm water is not chemically treated as is urban water. For every tax dollar that goes into providing agriculture with water, the government gets back two. That’s an investment, not a subsidy.

You misrepresented the facts about the water reclamation law. There are nearly 20,000 family farming companies that legally participate in the water reclamation project, while The Times points to only a handful of abuses. A study by the General Accounting Office reports that Western farmers are complying with the law.

Central Valley farmers have paid for their federal water several times over. Tax revenues generated by the water projects have amounted to $45 billion over the last five decades, while the investment has been only $9.5 billion over the last eight decades. According to the U.S. Bureau of Census, the average California farm size is 369 acres. Roughly half of these California farms have sales of $10,000 or less. Of those with sales of more than $10,000, over 80% consist of fewer than 500 acres.

Misinformation, such as spread by The Times, if repeated often and left unchallenged, becomes institutionalized as “fact.” It is time we set the record straight.

DAVID L. MOORE, President

Western Growers Assn., Irvine