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Comment by nicup12345689 | Hacker News Reader

And? They probably feed as many people

"The district and its farmers emphasize that they keep a steady stream of broccoli, lettuce, onions and other produce on American dinner tables, including in the dead of winter. But only a few families used a majority of the water they got to grow food that people eat."

It's mostly used to make hay to feed livestock

In other words, it is used to grow food that people eat?

> it is used to grow food that people eat

Yes, but in a hideously inefficient way. "Of the calories that cattle eat in feed, humans get a measly 3 percent in the beef we eat."

"livestock-centric U.S. agriculture—viewed by many as the pinnacle of efficiency—actually feeds fewer people per hectare, 5.4, than the less meat-focused Chinese, 8.4, or Indian, 5.9."

https://www.smallplanet.org/single-post/2016/11/10/meat-madn...

Feeding people hay is much less efficient than that.

Have you considered the possibility that there are other food crops that can be grown, and using much less water?

I have no reason to consider something off-topic, no.

> They probably feed as many people

"only a few families used a majority of the water they got to grow food that people eat."

"most use the bulk of their water growing hay to feed livestock"

It's well established that it takes more acres to feed a cow that's going to be turned into hamburgers and steaks than if they just grew food for people.

It's ok, people like hamburgers. What else would you use the land for?

This is about water use, as opposed to land use. Land use matters, but let's try to stay focused for a second, esp. b/c some of the livestock are not local to the feed grows.

The Colorado River has barely touched the Gulf of California for years. There is inherent value as well as economic value in the ecosystem services that result from allowing natural systems to thrive... or even just function at all.

Here is a nice summary of the state and characters in Colorado River ecology: https://www.coloradocollege.edu/dotAsset/cbb78858-d078-4a7c-...

I hope we are not so cynical as to suggest that the over-extraction of the river and the destruction of the reliant ecosystems is an acceptable consequence of human success.

Even if you like hamburgers, is it worth the cost to continue to over-extract for their production from locations that cannot support it just because people have been doing it for a while and have a strong sense of private property rights? Why shouldn't we tell these farmers to pay up for the water or go somewhere to produce that food where it is more abundant?

There are many crops that can be grown in dry area. Historically corn was an important crop in the desert southwest, as were beans and squash. More recently, amaranth. Also agave and other cactus fruit. If you've never had nopalitos, you're missing out.

In short, lots of food crops that require substantially less water. It's a different form of agriculture.

As for hamburgers: we can quibble over the exact figures, but globally, livestock production is responsible for anywhere from 11% to 19% of annual greenhouse gas production. Given that humanity is not going to go all plant-based suddenly, reducing the footprint of cattle production is imperative. Growing hay and shipping it around the world to feed cow is the opposite of sustainable.

It's going to be ok. Pursue beauty, enjoy life, it is too short. There is no guarantee a meteorite does not crash tomorrow and kills 95% of live beings on Earth. Not sure what you mean by sustainable.

Better worry about pollution, which you know, actually hurts currently living people.

It's a desert, so potentially nothing.

Do you like having water to drink? Cities are getting squeezed so that these desert farmers (who get the water for free) can feed their cattle or export hay/alfalfa to other countries.

Maybe people should just not expect to settle in a place where senior water rights held by others mean there is no supply of water for them?

So it is right and proper for a few extended families to determine the fate of an entire region? It's not even one city of millions, it is several we're talking about.

You mean the water rights of the Utes, Paiutes, Hope, Diné, Havasu, Mojave, Kumeyaay? I agree.

if you read the article, it notes that a large portion of that hay is shipped out of country.

so, not only does that water not feed Americans, it doesn't feed American cows.

it is much less water-intensive to grow feed-hay where there are not water shortages, let alone to ship that outside of the country that is already dealing with lack of water for major regions.

so what?

They mostly grow hay. A large portion of the hay is exported to other countries.

No, they don’t they feed hay to cows.

"hay" is USDA regulatory shorthand for grains and grasses fed to farm animals.

most of the "hay" exports to Saudi Arabia from Imperial county in California, and Yuma county in Arizona, of which I have personal and specific knowledge, is alfalfa - most valuable conversion of water rights for export.

And cows are somehow not eaten by people/don't produce milk?

They do, but the water:food conversion ratio is terrible.

Well that's first world for you.

Would you rather live in a world of 100 billion on efficient food only or 1 billion that can actually eat meat and other tasty things?

100 billion on efficient food only.

Or, you know, spread to space while we're at a local resource maximum.

So your ideal future is that of as many as possible miserable people?

In other words, you'd rather live in Bangladesh than the US you're apparently in? Why haven't you moved yet?

There's a difference between misery and limiting ones intake of climate-unsustainable calories. Not eating meat a few days of the week seems a small price to pay for allowing more people to live.

And walk me through how we limit population to allow resource excess, without artificial population controls and managing the economic impacts of a shrinking population, and I'll consider it.

All Western countries went into below-replacement fertility without any population control.

Life on soylent in a dorm is not worth living.

The majority of Western countries are consuming at a level, were it applied globally, would exhaust the planet.

Distracting people from fucking isn't a feasible sustainability target when applied to the whole world.

> The majority of Western countries are consuming at a level, were it applied globally, would exhaust the planet.

This is an argument against overpopulation, not for lowering living standards.

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