I saw [this](https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2023/05/22/climate/colorado-river-water.html) article today which mentions that 55% of water usage in the west is used for livestock feed. Is there a reason we can’t grow this feed in different parts of the country with more abundant water?
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We farm where the soil and climate are good and water is abundant. Even if it’s well water. Livestock is just an insanely inefficient way to produce food calories in an industrial society. We need *so much farmland* that it happens in places which require wellwater.
It depends. It doesn’t specify what crops are being grown for livestock feed. It’s possible that the only crops that grow successfully in that area are crops that are only suitable for livestock feed. You *could* grow livestock feed in part of the country with more water, but that would take away farmland from growing things humans can eat like wheat or corn, etc. You also have the issue of harvesting and transporting all of that feed from one part of the country to another. I’m not saying it’s impossible, but I can only imagine that it would be on a scale that isn’t really feasible.
The thing to remember is that a lot of that feed is just the grass and hay that the farmers grow on their land to feed their own livestock.
So, if you decide to grow all that hay elsewhere, you might as well move the livestock too (since that would be cheaper than paying to transport all of that feed).
Try looking at it from an individuals perspective, in a farmers perspective:
You have inherited/bought land and water rights, as well as farming machinery. The only logical choice is to use that and grow crops. Now, what crops do you want to grow? You want to grow the most profitable crops that you can, considering your land, the amount of water you are allowed to use, what you are legally allowed to plant, and your other constraints. If this turns out that livestock feed is the most profitable, you probably will grow that.
Now why don’t we as a society forbid planting of water-intensive crops with Colorado river water? There have been attempts, but these have so far all been squashed by resistance from water right holders/farmers, since they would loose their livelihood and what their families have built up for generations. It would probably also mean that meat could get more expensive, which doesn’t make the decision more attractive to politicians and their voters.
To add to that, IIRC the water rights on the Colorado river are “use it or loose it”, meaning that if you don’t use the water you are allowed to use, then in future you might only be allowed to use the amount that you actually needed. Which is pretty bad long-term if you want to expand/plant more water-intesive crops. Because getting water rights (back) is near impossible due to the ever-shrinking amount of water available. That further incentiveses you to use all the water you are allowed to, in order to not cripple your future once/if water rights get reduced due to climate change.
It’s not that we can’t, it’s that there are other higher value crops.
If you have land for crops you probably have some amount of water access with it. Financially, you should grow the highest value crop with the weather and water you have available. That means things like rice or almonds or pistachios.
Livestock feed is kind of the bottom of the barrel, it doesn’t need much, so you grow it where you can’t grow other things.
I don’t understand why the Saudis grow alfalfa in Arizona. Why not in coastal Texas where it rains.
There are a few other factors as to why AZ and parts of the desert west are used this way.
Length of growing season- Alfalfa is a perennial crop fed to dairy and beef cattle. Great protein source and fiber for cattle, and since it’s perennial you don’t have to go through the expense of planting it every year and all the field prep associated with that. With places like AZ and Southern California having 10-11 months of good growing season for alfalfa, that means they can get more than the typical 2-3 cuttings off of an alfalfa field that people up north do. The arid climate also increases the quality of the hay because it is allowed to naturally dry out after cutting without heavy dew or rain spoiling it.
Animal Health- for many of the same reasons people move to the climate, animals actually can survive on less feed in these climates. Farther north, it’s cold more months of the year and animals need to burn extra calories just to stay warm. Those are tons of feed that don’t go towards producing milk or beef and are just lost.
Demand- if you look at the Colorado river basin and California’s Central Valley, there are several different huge metropolitan areas within a couple hours of most of these farms. If you go east, it can be 500-750+ miles before you hit other areas capable of producing large quantities of feed. All the milk, egg, and meat demands of these metro areas draws in more local production because the freight from farther east would be very costly and logistically hard to keep up year round. The cities themselves are what cause the land to be used in this way. I can almost guarantee you the first farmers/ ranchers in these areas didn’t plan to be irrigated dairy farmers. Demand in the area drove prices for fresh milk and eggs up high enough that governments and the farmers were incentivized enough to build the infrastructure for all of this irrigation and start farming the desert in order to meet demands of the masses. A bit of the chicken or the egg conundrum, pun intended 😂
In a direct answer to your question of why can’t we grow livestock feed in areas with more abundant water, the answer is, we do! I would say that the percentage of crop grown to feed animals in the plains, midwest, and eastern parts of the country that receive more natural rainfall is not as far off the 55% as what the article states about the arid west. Ethanol production and soybean oil production in the Midwest produce high quality animal feeds as a byproduct of the main process, and often times the byproduct is actually the most profitable part of the process. These feeds are fed locally, as well as shipped globally in bulk.
I could go on, but that’s just the short end of what I can explain, as a farmer myself. Personally, it blows my mind how much of what I personally farm goes to feeding birds for entertainment of people in cities, rather than the people themselves. It’s all supply and demand, and we have to follow that to make a living.
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