California Organic Dairy Farmers Hit Hard By Drought

It’s easy to see the impact of the three-year-long California drought in residential areas anywhere in the state. Just look for brown lawns or green lawns with patches of brown. Or drive through parts of the San Joaquin Valley and see idled farmland. It’s harder to see with the naked eye the effects of the drought on the dairy industry in general and the organic dairy industry specifically. But report after report by various media outlets reveals that organic dairy farmers are being hit very hard in the Golden State.

California is the state with the most organic dairy cows, and it gained that spot in just a few years. California had less than 100 organic dairy farms in 2008, according to the Agricultural Marketing Resource Center. By 2011, the state had 57,809 certified organic dairy cows, making it the state with the highest amount of them. California is clearly an important state for organic dairy production. And the lack of rainfall in the state means it’s hard for organic dairy farmers to keep grasses green.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) requires that organic dairy farmers put their cows out to pasture for the entire grazing season, or no less than 120 days. The cows must receive at least 30 percent of their feed from pasture. Back in January, California organic dairy farmers received a temporary reprieve from the pasture requirements for February and March. The USDA issued a temporary variance from the regulations for 53 out of 58 California counties designated as “primary natural disaster areas” due to the drought. The USDA stated that it will “reassess this temporary variance as the year progresses to determine whether further action is to be taken due to drought conditions.”

Despite the temporary reprieve earlier this year, organic dairy farmers in California are still hurting. Albert Strauss is a Petaluma-based organic dairy producer and owns Strauss Family Creamery. He told the Los Angeles Times he has “no irrigation and our reservoirs are dry.” The 500 acres his dairy cows roam are brown. “We've already depleted all last year's crops,” he said. He is not sure how he will be able to “go another year beyond this.” Multiply his plight across the organic dairy industry in California, and you get the true picture. These are desperate and hard times for California organic dairy farmers.

The entire California agriculture industry is hurting, as a study from the University of California, Davis Center for Watershed Sciences shows. Released in July, the study found that the total statewide economic cost of the 2014 drought is $2.2 billion. The drought is the third most severe on record and is responsible for California agriculture’s greatest water loss. River water loss for Central San Joaquin Valley farms has decreased by roughly one-third.

Farmers are making up for the loss of river water through groundwater pumping, which the study expects to replace most river water losses. However, the cost of groundwater pumping is high. The study puts it at $1.5 billion, or 3 percent of the state’s total agricultural value. If the drought continues for two more years, farmers will continue to use groundwater pumping. Pumping ability will decrease slowly while the costs of groundwater pumping increase.

Image credit: cheeseslave