This Episode of #PlanetMoney About California Farming and Water is a #MustListen but it Made Me Really Angry

I love podcasts but have a hard time catching up with them. Sometimes I find myself weeks or months behind after not listening for a while, so this podcast was posted back on July 22, 2015. Listen to it here or read the transcript.

This episode of PLANET MONEY, an always entertaining money-covering podcast often covers the topic of economics in a very approachable way. The reporters on the NPR-produced podcast come across as balanced, well-educated people. Which is great, but sometimes they come across as too balanced. Sometimes, there simply aren’t even two sides to a story.

 In a nutshell (preemptive pun not intended), this episode is about how pistachio farmers in California are dealing with the huge drought. Specifically, it deals with how nut farmers, are among the only entities in California that are able to dig far enough down to reach receding water levels that are now out of reach for the wells of some California residents. One reporter asked a water scientist where things were headed in this area of California and he referred to the Mad Max movies.

 Yikes.

The episode goes on to explain why farmers are still planting nut trees during this crazy drought despite a gallon of water being required to grow a single pistachio. Turns out, it’s the drought. See, the drought is making nuts scarce so the price is going up and so that makes farmers want to plant more trees so they can sell more nuts while the price is high. It makes good financial sense, right? Except, California is running out of water thanks to a historically bad drought… and because of farmers who are planting more nut trees. See, agriculture is pretty much the biggest drinker of water. But hey, you know, economics.

Maybe there’s something more important than economics? Not according to the NPR reporters who work on PLANET MONEY.

FLOW (2008)

Buy it!

Would you recommend it? Definitely. In fact, I think most of us in the Western World are so in the dark about water, I think this documentary should be required watching.


Technically any good? While it does come across as very heavy-handed and preachy and doesn't try too hard to present any opposing view points (though it does try), the facts it presents are undeniable and incredibly disturbing. It's downright scary how much power big business has over the water in the ground. And just think about how important water is to commerce--as a result, water ends up being the number 3 commodity behind oil and electricity. Yeah. I didn't know that either. Another fact it presents is that humans account for just 10% of the water use in the world. The rest is split unevenly between agriculture and business--the majority of which goes to business.


How did it leave me feeling? Angry, for two reasons. First, because no one seems to be aware of or have a problem with these giant companies using and controlling so much water. Second because the film pretends that a few isolated victories against these corporations means that we can stop them. Protests have stopped some companies from essentially stealing water, but Coca-Cola, for instance, is a huge company. They didn't lose that battle in India, they just put their resources someplace else instead of wasting time with a bunch of protesters. So, I could have done without the corny, "speak truth to power" BS and stuck with the fear-mongering since that's what is needed.


Would you sit through it again? YES! I want to go over the facts presented again and try to pick up on things I missed the first time through. This docu is jammed with interesting stuff and interesting people.

Seriously, watch this movie!!

Every Day Should Be World Water Day!! (But officially it was yesterday :( )

Water, it's that's stuff you're living in!

Yep, if you're reading this, odds are you already know that a huge amount of your body is made up of water. The overwhelming majority of our planet is covered in water. Every beverage we drink has at least some amount of water in it.

But what happens if that water isn't clean?

People get sick, that's what.

Now, in way-cool "hip" countries like the US, UK, and other "in" places we've got stuff like cholera and typhoid taken care of but this is not the case in countries that couldn't care less about Brangelina or reality TV. Last fall, over in America's 51st state (Iraq), they suffered an outbreak of cholera that killed quite a few Iraqis, sadly. Via a post on WWD at LeslieBradshaw.com, here's a nice illustration demonstrating where cholera is hitting Earth the most.

So, clean drinking water is clearly a problem and it's something we can all help raise awareness about. How can you help more folks know about issues regarding clean drinking water? For starters, you can blog about it yourself. You can tell your friends and family about it. Or you could do something as simple as joining the World Water Day Facebook group. You can follow WorldH2O and Chlorine on Twitter. For each person who joins the Facebook group, follows WorldH2O and Chlorine, the American Chemistry Council will contribute five chlorine tablets designed to disinfect 100 liters of water to areas of the world that are struggling to find clean drinking water.

Easy!!

So, just do it and help! As of two days ago, people who have joined the FB group, and followed both WorldH2O and Chlorine on Twitter have helped donate enough chlorine tablets to clean over 180,000 liters of water--that's over 47,000 gallons of water.

YEAH.

In case you're curious, cholera causes diarrhea. Diarrhea can cause massive dehydration pretty quickly (sometimes within hours). Dehydration means your body is losing water. Remember your body is mostly made of water. Lose that and most of what keeps you alive is gone--and so are you.

Don't believe me? Watch this awesome vid from good.is:



Special thanks to TheLeslie at LeslieBradshaw.com for informing me about Word Water Day. I wish I knew how she hears about these things!! :) Sorry this is a day late, but hey, shouldn't every day be a day we think about clean water?

Water Vs. War: Which Would You Fight For?

A couple days ago, fellow blogger and all-around concerned individual Leslie Bradshaw posted something on her blog about the 100th anniversary of the treatment of water here in the US. Yep, we've been using chemicals like chlorine to treat our water for a century. Normally, I say chemicals are not the way to go--however, there are things that live in water that can kill us. I say do what you have to do to get things like cholera and typhoid out of the water we're drinking--and that's just what started to happen one hundred years ago last month.

But this is not to say that the rest is history. Sure, cholera and typhoid are not an issue in the US of the 21st century. However, that's not the case in the developing world. Back in March of 2008 I wrote about a new water treatment device from inventor Dean Kamen. Kamen had been on The Colbert Report demonstrating the device and informing us on some water statistics. He talked about how implementing this device would stop 50% of the world's diseases in their tracks.

This is how important clean water is, yet it's being ignored constantly by damn near everyone.

TheLeslie blogs about the 100th Anniversary of water treatment here in the US, and as far as I can tell, she's practically the only person who's talked about it. She linked to a post on HuffPo about it and an article at http://Independent.co.uk about cholera in Iraq, but when I Googled for "water treatment" all I got were stories about the process of treating water (the Wikipedia article, a page from the EPA on it, etc). I found nothing about the 100th Anniversary and nothing about how most of the developing world desperately needs clean water. Maybe the blogosphere moves too quickly and it's already moved on from this subject?

Should it be this hard to find news and info on one of the most important things on the planet?

Regardless, the importance of clean water has not gone away in the last 100 years.

So, I'll stand firmly on my soap box and ask you one question:

Why are we spending hundreds of billions on a war in Iraq, hundreds of billions more on a war in Afghanistan, hundreds of billions more on a bailout for Wall Street, when hundreds of millions of people are suffering from diseases related to a lack of clean water.

As a race of humans on this little blue ball, you'd think we'd be able to secure clean water for all 6 billion of us.

How can you and I help get clean water to everyone who needs it? To be honest, I don't know. Leslie links to a quiz about water that, for every right answer, promises funds to be donated to delivering clean water to households in west Africa. That's a cool start for sure. There is also Ethos Water--at their website, EthosWater.com, you can learn about how they are helping bring clean water to kids in the developing world. It has something to do with Starbucks--yeah, this has kind of derailed the end of my post.

All I know how to do really well is blog. And blog is what I've been doing. For several years now, I've been following the topic of water--ever since my best friend, Britt, told me about water rights wars he had read about in Africa. I did some research and read about a war for water rights here in North America back in 2003. I even stumbled across a copy of a GREAT miniseries called H2O. It's directed by Charles Binamé, co-written by and stars Paul Gross, and is a fictional account of political intrigue, corruption and water rights in Canada that involves the first black President of the United States.

Sadly, I can't find H2O on DVD anywhere. If you can find it, I HIGHLY recommend watching it. It's some of the best writing I've seen. Also, if you find it, please let me know where you got it. I can't find my copy after my recent move to NYC :(

Another funny connection I have to water rights is a show TheWife was in three years in a row back in Los Angeles. In fact, they're in rehearsals right now for this year's production of A Mulholland Christmas Carol (sans TheWife, sadly). Mulholland Christmas Carol written by Bill Robens and Kiff Scholl, is a musical comedy that tells the story of how William Mulholland legally stole water from a far-away county in order to allow Los Angeles to survive, thrive and grow (while that far away county all but dried up and died). You can learn more about this year's production at TheatreOfNote.com. If you live in LA or will be there between Thanksgiving and Christmas CHECK THIS SHOW OUT! It's truly a lot of fun and it does a great job of weaving historical facts, pop culture, great music and humor all together to teach the audience about how LA came to get the water that flows from it's taps.

Water is very likely the most important thing in our lives. Yet it's something we hardly ever think about. So while I have no idea how we can help get clean water to the people who need it most, at least some of us are blogging about it.

Do you know how to help bring clean water to the developing world? Post a comment, I want to help, too.

For more facts about water treatment a hundred years ago and today, check out Leslie's post here: http://lesliebradshaw.com/?p=158

UPDATE 20081121: I found my copy of H20! And check it out! We have a black president for real now! o_O Whoa... spooky...