California is currently undergoing a severe drought that has been going on for the last four of years. This drought is currently the worst drought California has ever had in its history. In the last four years California has received minimal rainfall, leading to major water shortages all across the state. Many residents living in California are blind to the fact of how big of a problem the drought really is. Pretty much everyone living in the state of California is affected by the drought in one way or another. The drought needs be taken seriously as it causes many problems all across the state. The drought is causing major harm to the state that many people are not really aware of. Two constituencies being affected by the drought significantly are the farming industry and the ecosystems in California.
The state of California is the largest farm state in the country, in 2014 the farming industry made $48 billion in sales ("Policy Priorities for Managing Drought" 2015). The farming industry in California are among the most being affected by the drought. Farmers are having to adapt to the major water shortages in California by using groundwater for irrigation. Using the ground water can be more costly and it is only a short term solution because there is only so much ground water we can use. The farms in California require large quantities of water for irrigation, farmers use about 40 percent of California's available water, compared with 10 percent used in cities ("What if California's Drought Continues" 2015). According to PPIC in 2014 central valley farms in California lost roughly a third of normal surface water supplies ("What if California's Drought Continues" 2015). The drought also affects the employment in the farms. With normal water supplies, California would have had 7,500 farm jobs in 2014 and an additional 10,100 farm jobs this year ("Water for Farms" 2015).
