Irrigation Organizations: Drought Planning and Response

Steven Wallander, Aaron Hrozencik and Marcel Aillery

No 316790, USDA Miscellaneous from United States Department of Agriculture

Abstract: Using data from USDA’s 2019 Survey of Irrigation Organizations (SIO), this report provides an over-view of drought planning and response by irrigation districts, ditch companies, groundwater districts, and other similar irrigation organizations. While drought planning is common among State and local governments, only one-fifth of irrigation organizations have a formal drought plan. The majority of those plans include strategies for curtailing water deliveries or groundwater pumping in the event of drought. Irrigation organizations depend upon a wide range of meteorological and hydrologic data sources to plan for and respond to drought. These data allow organizations to choose which short- (e.g., land fallowing, leasing supplemental water supplies) and long-run (e.g., managed aquifer recharge) water management strategies best enhance their resiliency to drought. Conservation investments (e.g., flow rate metering and canal lining or piping) are another tool to improve long-run drought resilience. The most common reason that irrigation organizations cite for making these investments is “water supply variability and production risk,” which illustrates the important role that these organizations play in determining the resilience of the irrigated agricultural sector to drought and water scarcity.

Keywords: Agribusiness; Environmental Economics and Policy; Farm Management; Land Economics/Use; Resource/Energy Economics and Policy (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 30
Date: 2022-01-06
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-agr and nep-env
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ags:usdami:316790

DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.316790

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