Central Valley Economy Will Hurt Due to 5 % Water Allocation

With so many tree nut growers in the Central San Joaquin Valley, that 5% water allocation from Federal Water Districts; well, the economy that goes with it could be devastated.

Ryan Jacobsen is a CEO of the Fresno County farm Bureau. Keeping a close eye on this economy in Fresno County. “It will definitely be devastating to all of the above. Here in Fresno County, I mean it's years like this year where, you know, we will lose the number one status in gross ag production and tree nuts are a big part of that,” he said.

“There's just no way we're able to continue it our #1 county status when we don't have the water allocations. I mean, our local economy is just so dependent upon what these water allocations are,” Jacobsen said. “Farmers can make do temporarily with this. We hope this isn't the second year of a multi-year drought like we saw in 2011 through 2019 s but, we are hopeful that things will turn around,” Jacobsen said,

Jacobsen said that California is just under a system of a boom and bust cycle.

“We always talk about this average year and the average year doesn't exist. The average year is made up of very wet years and then it's made up of dry years. And this just happens to be where we have seen a very dry year. Last year was on the drier side. So, when you have a very dry year on the heels of a dry year, it does kind of exacerbate and shows the problems with our system,” Jacobsen said. “We would hope that this is just another reminder of the importance of us continuing to build our infrastructure in the state so that we can weather the lack of rain and snow a bit better.”