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Is it? A significant proportion of that agriculture consists of luxury crops for export. Nobody's going to starve if the price of water-intensive foods like avo

Is it? A significant proportion of that agriculture consists of luxury crops for export. Nobody's going to starve if the price of water-intensive foods like avocado and almonds increase a little. If you care about feeding the poor, give them money to buy their food. Don't wreck the environment and distort the market with supply-side meddling.

PerfectElement 11y ago
Why avocados? It takes 74.1 gallons to produce 1 pound. Much less than most calorie-dense foods.
emp 11y ago
Don't forget raising animals for meat, growing food to feed animals, and growing food for export to feed animals. This accounts for more water than almonds that seem to always be the scapegoat.
- jkyle 11y ago
  Another interesting fact about almonds. They're actually the most cost effective use of water from the volume to profit ratio. So, yes, it takes more water the produce a bushel of almonds then it does to produce a bushel of <whatever>. However, that bushel of almonds earns more profit per gallon. What does this mean? It means if you start charging farmers for water usage (rather than access) then almonds are a more attractive crop then others crops from a profit perspective. Counter to what most believe, restricting farmer's water access or charging more for water might actually increase the shift to certain water intensive luxury crops like almonds.
yellowapple 11y ago
> If you care about feeding the poor, give them money to buy their food. Yep. Let's make the poor people dependent on the rich people for basic sustenance instead of allowing food to actually be affordable. Let's also marginalize the people who are just barely not poor enough to qualify for such a thing, because "well, sorry that you're barely keeping your family above the poverty line, but you know, gotta blame the farmers for being inconvenient to the cityfolk, and you're not quite as poor as this family over here so why should we care about your problems?". Any system that depends on the arbitrarily-defined concept of "poverty" v. "not-poverty" is a non-answer to many lower and lower-middle class households.

PerfectElement 11y ago

Why avocados? It takes 74.1 gallons to produce 1 pound. Much less than most calorie-dense foods.

emp 11y ago

Don't forget raising animals for meat, growing food to feed animals, and growing food for export to feed animals. This accounts for more water than almonds that seem to always be the scapegoat.

jkyle 11y ago
Another interesting fact about almonds. They're actually the most cost effective use of water from the volume to profit ratio. So, yes, it takes more water the produce a bushel of almonds then it does to produce a bushel of <whatever>. However, that bushel of almonds earns more profit per gallon. What does this mean? It means if you start charging farmers for water usage (rather than access) then almonds are a more attractive crop then others crops from a profit perspective. Counter to what most believe, restricting farmer's water access or charging more for water might actually increase the shift to certain water intensive luxury crops like almonds.

yellowapple 11y ago

> If you care about feeding the poor, give them money to buy their food. Yep. Let's make the poor people dependent on the rich people for basic sustenance instead of allowing food to actually be affordable. Let's also marginalize the people who are just barely not poor enough to qualify for such a thing, because "well, sorry that you're barely keeping your family above the poverty line, but you know, gotta blame the farmers for being inconvenient to the cityfolk, and you're not quite as poor as this family over here so why should we care about your problems?". Any system that depends on the arbitrarily-defined concept of "poverty" v. "not-poverty" is a non-answer to many lower and lower-middle class households.