Food Security in Our Basin

For once I, as a farmer, agree with Duke about the drought (Greenville News 5/5/13). It is not at an end. Water is in short supply the world over and is in crisis in many vast regions in the USA.

The Sunday May 5, 2013 article fails to reflect that roughly 95% of our food locally comes from outside our bioregion, our Upper Savannah River water basin, and that the world’s food security is in real jeopardy from burgeoning population, global warming(destabilization), pollution beyond planetary limits, water and land shortage. Thanks to Google Earth type information we now know the planet has only 9% arable land left for Agriculture expansion.

The word Agriculture occurred once in reference to the state Drought Response Committee but not when it came to the Army Corps of Engineers balancing of water uses in the basin. Dennis Chastain, our local rep on the state Drought Response Committee, said “farmers need to know” implying …so they can pay to import water from other regions in the form of hay or grocery stores can pay for water in fruits, vegetables and grains from other regions. Nor has it been considered by the Duke nuclear re-licensing effort.

Our basin lacks water for agriculture, especially plant agriculture. Currently Duke and the Army Corps of Engineers are exporting our water in the form of energy that is supplied to the grid that supplies a multi state area. This is done through water used for hydroelectric generation and cooling nuclear reactors. It is further being exported to keep ships afloat (so we can import more water in the form of food and fiber) and prevent salt water intrusion in the lower Savannah River Basin. No mention is made of how this water could be recycled in the basin producing food locally and providing local food security.

Yes, we would lose a little to evaporation and transpiration of irrigated plants during the summer months but a lot is already being lost as pure evaporation from the surface of the lakes in the upper part of the basin. With the right research from our land grant institution, Clemson University, to convert all our cropping systems to perennials and bio engineering to increase the depth of carbon sequestration by the ecosphere it could be a win-win situation.

Walker Miller, farmer

Six Mile, SC