Georgia Farmers Bidding to Just Say No to Irrigation

With Georgia looking at its fourth straight summer of drought, the state is holding a no-irrigation auction: It is offering to pay farmers not to water their fields.

The state has set aside $10 million from the national tobacco settlement to pay farmers in 42 counties to forgo irrigation in a region that includes cotton farms and the nation’s most fertile peanut fields.

Farmers who accept the money can still try to grow crops, but their fields may wither if the summer is as dry as the last three years. If the summer is wet, the farmers can keep the money and still have a healthy crop.

“If we have good, moderate rains this summer on a timely basis, [the no-irrigation payments] will be a great thing for farmers,” said Tommy Irvin, Georgia’s agriculture commissioner. “If it turns really hot and the crop perishes in the field, it could be a disaster for farmers.”

Many farmers signed up Friday for the weekend auction. Most of them were not particularly excited about the idea but were resigned to the need to do something to conserve water.

“I don’t know of a single farmer who has admitted he likes it,” said Harold Wilson, the county extension coordinator in Terrell County.

Ever since the New Deal, the federal government has used subsidies to prop up agricultural prices, paying farmers not to grow certain crops.

But Irvin said he knows of no other state that has held an auction to pay farmers not to irrigate. And Tim Senn of the Natural Resources Conservation Service, a branch of the U.S. Agriculture Department, concurred.

“In this time of depressed agricultural commodity prices, there needs to be some compensation for reducing yields,” Senn said.

Farmers will submit written bids offering not to irrigate acreage for a certain amount of money. A computer will analyze the bids and determine which to accept.

Some farmers said they have heard the state is considering payments of $100 an acre--an amount they consider insufficient--but the state has not confirmed that.

Large areas of the country have been gripped by drought recently.

On Friday, the government began making $1.1 billion in payments to 160,000 farmers who lost crops to drought and other weather-related disasters last year. Texas, North Dakota, Nebraska and Kansas were among the states with the greatest demand for the money.

At opposite corners of the nation, drought in the Pacific Northwest threatens the salmon population and hydroelectric power generation, and Florida is the driest it has been in a century.

Last week, officials approved the tightest water restrictions ever in South Florida. Residents will be allowed to water lawns only one day a week. Limits also will apply to golf courses, car washes, nurseries and farms.