<html><body style="word-wrap: break-word; -webkit-nbsp-mode: space; -webkit-line-break: after-white-space; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(17, 17, 17); font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 16px; "><a href="http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/04/09/1376701/-California-Water-Restrictions-MUST-Include-Big-Ag-Big-Oil-and-Nestl">http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/04/09/1376701/-California-Water-Restrictions-MUST-Include-Big-Ag-Big-Oil-and-Nestl</a></span><div class="article" style="margin-top: 12px; "><font class="Apple-style-span" color="#111111"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 16px; "><div class="article" style="margin-top: 12px; "><font class="Apple-style-span" face="Verdana" size="6">California Water Restrictions MUST Include Big Ag, Big Oil and Nestlé! </font></div></span></font><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(17, 17, 17); font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 16px; "> </span></div><div class="article" style="margin-top: 12px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(17, 17, 17); font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 16px; ">by Dan Bacher</span></div><div class="article" style="margin-top: 12px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(17, 17, 17); font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 16px; ">The mainstream media and state officials have for years tried to portray California as the "green" leader of the nation. In reality, California suffers from some of the greatest environmental degradation of any state in the nation, since corporate agribusiness, the oil industry and other big money interests control the majority of the state's politicians and exert inordinate influence over the state's environmental policies. </span></div><div class="article" style="margin-top: 12px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(17, 17, 17); font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 16px; ">California is currently in a state of emergency, with NASA scientists saying that California has only about one year of water left in reserves, according to Food and Water Watch. This is largely due to the gross mismanagement of California's reservoirs, rivers and groundwater supplies, during a record drought, to serve the 1 percent.</span></div><div class="article" style="margin-top: 12px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(17, 17, 17); font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 16px; ">California Governor Jerry "Big Oil" Brown's recent water restrictions on cities and counties are woefully inadequate. Big agribusiness, oil interests and bottled water companies continue to deplete and pollute California's precious groundwater resources that are crucial for saving water. </span></div><div class="article" style="margin-top: 12px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(17, 17, 17); font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 16px; ">It's clear that the severity of this drought calls for much more than just individual action like cutting back on showers. </span></div><div class="article" style="margin-top: 12px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(17, 17, 17); font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 16px; ">Sooner or later we have to stop subsidizing corporate agribusiness, growing almonds and other export crops on toxic land, soil that should have never been irrigated, with cheap water and other subsidies. The idea of big corporate growers "suffering" during the drought is a classic example of the "Big Lie" that has been spread by agribusiness, the Brown administration and Big Ag Astroturf groups. </span></div><div class="article" style="margin-top: 12px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(17, 17, 17); font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 16px; ">At a press conference in Sacramento on April 8 after meeting with water agency and agribusiness leaders, Governor Brown said that the "key is to get the water and not point fingers" during the drought. </span></div><div class="article" style="margin-top: 12px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(17, 17, 17); font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 16px; ">Barbara Barrigan-Parrilla, Executive Director of Restore the Delta, responded, "We have already sent a tweet asking him get the water for whom? Westlands? Paramount Farms?" </span></div><div class="article" style="margin-top: 12px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(17, 17, 17); font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 16px; ">Natural Resources Secretary John Laird claims that "everybody is a soldier in the fight" to address the drought. Yes, everybody except those planting almonds in the drought! </span></div><div class="article" style="margin-top: 12px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(17, 17, 17); font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 16px; ">According to the "On the Public Record blog (<a href="http://onthepublicrecord.org/">http://onthepublicrecord.org</a>), almond acreage in California has expanded by 70,000 acres, a total of 280,000 acre feet per year of new water demand: </span></div><div class="article" style="margin-top: 12px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(17, 17, 17); font-family: Verdana; line-height: 16px; "><i>"I have marked the almond acreage at the beginning and end of the 2006-2009 drought (700,000 acres at the beginning, 810,000 acres at the end). At the beginning of our current drought, almond acreage was 870,000 acres. In 2013, after two years of drought, it was up to 940,000 acres. It looks like the 2014 California Almond Acreage Report comes out at the end of April (here’s 2013). I will be excited to see a new total acreage. </i></span></div><div class="article" style="margin-top: 12px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(17, 17, 17); font-family: Verdana; line-height: 16px; "><i>Let’s make this all explicit. Since this drought began, almonds have expanded by 70,000 acres. That’s 280,000 acft/year of new water demand for a snack that will be exported. That water will come from groundwater or from other farmers. At the same time, the California EPA is literally telling urban users to take five minute cold showers. If there is a lot of new acreage in 2014 and 2015, it is going to be difficult for the Brown administration to stay friends with them." </i></span></div><div class="article" style="margin-top: 12px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(17, 17, 17); font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 16px; ">You can take action NOW to stop corporate agribusiness, big oil companies and Nestle and other bottled water companies from depleting California's precious water supplies during a record drought by going to: <a href="https://secure3.convio.net/fww/site/Advocacy?cmd=display&page=UserAction&id=2011&s_src=taf_sp&sp_ref=113679618.63.12411.f.50225.4">https://secure3.convio.net/fww/site/Advocacy?cmd=display&page=UserAction&id=2011&s_src=taf_sp&sp_ref=113679618.63.12411.f.50225.4</a> </span></div><div class="article" style="margin-top: 12px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="color: rgb(17, 17, 17); font-family: verdana, arial, sans-serif; line-height: 16px; ">On March 20, environmental and human rights activists, holding plastic “torches” and “pitchforks,” formed human barricades at both entrances to the Nestlé Waters bottling plant in Sacramento at 5:00 a.m., effectively shutting down the company's operations for the day. To read the complete story, go to: <a href="http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/03/27/1373887/-Activists-Shut-Down-Nestl-Water-Bottling-Plant-in-Sacramento">http://www.dailykos.com/story/2015/03/27/1373887/-Activists-Shut-Down-Nestl-Water-Bottling-Plant-in-Sacramento</a> </span><font class="Apple-style-span" color="#111111"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 16px; "></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 16px; "></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 16px; "></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 16px; "></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 16px; "></span><div class="article" style="margin-top: 12px; "><font class="Apple-style-span" face="verdana, arial, sans-serif"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="line-height: 16px;"><br></span></font></div></font></div></body></html>