NFFC’s national program coordinator, Jordan Treakle, was quoted by the New York Times. The article takes a look at groundwater management in California’s Pajaro Valley.
In the central California valley’s Westlands water district, where many farmers fought the groundwater-management law, the board of directors will soon vote on a plan that would allow growers to pay for credits to use groundwater above a certain allocation. They could buy and sell the credits, starting at about $200 a credit. A handful of other water districts in California are implementing similar measures.
Many farmers worry about the beginning of such a trend.
“The concern is that any kind of pricing scheme or market based mechanism that tries to manage or distribute this resource is likely to privilege a certain kind of producer — a multinational corporation — at the expense of small-scale independent farmers,” said Jordan Treakle, program coordinator for the National Family Farm Coalition.