Today’s New York Times has a compelling article on big drops in water levels in the High Plains Aquifer that farmers rely on for irrigation in a huge swath of land stretching from Wyoming down to Texas.
Some Kansas farmers who have been raising corn are having to switch to less water-intensive, less profitable, crops like milo and sorghum.
And read a Financial Times article on China’s pressing water problems.
The article describes a region where 10,000 people — known as shengtai yimin, or “ecological migrants” – have left their homes because of water shortages. And the article cites a 2007 World Bank estimate that water problems cost China economic losses of 2.3 per cent of gross domestic product.