excerpted from the book: Water Wars
by Vandana Shiva
South End Press, 2002
Destruction of water resources and of forest catchments and aquifers is a form
of terrorism. Denying poor people access to water by privatizing water
distribution or polluting wells and rivers is also terrorism. In the ecological
context of water wars, terrorists are not just those hiding in the caves of
Afghanistan. Some are hiding in corporate boardrooms and behind the free trade
rules of the WTO, North American Free Trade Agreement (AFTA), and Free Trade
Area of the Americas (FTAA). They are hiding behind the privatization
conditionalities of the IMF and World Bank. By refusing to sign the (Kyoto
protocol, President Bush is committing an act of ecological terrorism on
numerous communities who may very well be wiped off the earth by global
warming. In Seattle, the WTO was dubbed the "World Terrorist Organization" by
protestors because its rules are denying millions the right to a sustainable
livelihood.
Greed and appropriation of other people's share of the planet's precious
resources are at the root of conflicts, and the root of terrorism. When
President Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair announced that the goal of the
global war on terrorism is the defense of the American and European "way of
life," they are declaring a war against the planet-its oil, its water, its
biodiversity. A way of life for the 20 percent of the earth's people ~ who use
80 percent of the planet's resources will dispossess 80 percent of its people
of their just share of resources and eventually destroy the planet. We cannot
survive as a species if greed is privileged and protected and the economics of
the greedy set the rules for how we live and die.
The ecology of terror shows us the path to peace. Peace lies in nourishing
ecological and economic democracy and nurturing diversity. Democracy is not
merely an electoral ritual but the power of people to shape their destiny,
determine how their natural resources are owned and utilized, how their thirst
is quenched, how their food is produced and distributed, and what health and
education systems they have.
p1
Although two - thirds of our planet is water, we face an acute water shortage.
The water crisis is the most pervasive, most severe, and most invisible
dimension of the ecological devastation of the earth. In 1998, 28 countries
experienced water stress or scarcity. This number is expected to rise to 56 by
2025. Between 1990 and 2025 the number of people living in countries without
adequate water is projected to rise from 131 million to 817 million. India is
supposed to fall into the water stress category long before 2025.
A country is said to be facing a serious water crisis when available water is
lower than 1,000 cubic meters per person per year. Below this point, the health
and economic development of a nation are considerably hampered. When the annual
water availability per person drops below 500 cubic meters, people's survival
is grievously compromised. In 1951, the average water availability in India was
3,450 cubic meters per person per year. By the late 1990s, it had fallen to
1,250 cubic meters. By 2050, it is projected to fall to 760 cubic meters. Since
1970, the global per capita water supply has declined by 33 percent. The decline
does not result from population growth alone; it is exacerbated by excessive
water use as well. During the last century, the rate of water withdrawal has
exceeded that of population growth by a factor of two and one-half.
p15
Market assumptions are blind to the ecological limits set by the water cycle and
the economic limits set by poverty. Over-exploitation of water and disruption of
the water cycle create absolute scarcity that markets cannot substitute with
other commodities. The assumption of substitution is in fact central to logic
of commodification. For example, economist Jack Hirshleifer and his colleagues
state:
This is not to deny that as a commodity, water has its special features, for
example, its supply is provided by nature partly as a store and partly as a
flow, and it is available without cost in some locations but rather expensive
to transport to others. Whatever reason we cite, however, the alleged unique
importance of water disappears upon analysis.
Such abstract arguments miss the most crucial point - when water disappears,
there is no alternative. For Third World women, water scarcity means traveling
longer distances in search of water. For peasants, it means starvation and
destitution as drought wipes out their crops. For children, it means
dehydration and death. There is simply no substitute for this precious liquid,
necessary for the biological survival of animals and plants.
The water crisis is an ecological crisis with commercial causes but no market
solutions. Market solutions destroy the earth and aggravate inequality. The
solution to an ecological crisis is ecological, and the solution for injustice
is democracy. Ending the water crisis requires rejuvenating ecological
democracy.
p20
With globalization and privatization of water resources, new efforts to
completely erode people's rights and replace collective ownership with
corporate control are under way. That communities of real people with real
needs exist beyond the state and the market is often forgotten in the rush for
privatization.
p21
As natural rights, water rights are usufructuary rights; water can be used but
not owned. People have a right to life and the resources that sustain it, such
as water. The necessity of water to life is why, under customary laws, the
right to water has been accepted as a natural, social fact.
p24
Parading as the anonymous market, the rich and powerful use the state to
appropriate water from nature and people through the prior-appropriation
doctrine. Private interest groups systematically ignore the option of community
control over water. Because water falls on earth in a dispersed manner, because
every living being needs water, decentralized management and democratic
ownership are the only efficient, sustainable, and equitable systems for the
sustenance of all. Beyond the state and the market lies the power of community
participation. Beyond bureaucracies and corporate power lies the promise of
water democracy.
... Water is a commons because it is the ecological basis of all life and
because its sustainability and equitable allocation depend on cooperation among
community members. Although water has been managed as a commons throughout human
history and across diverse cultures, and although most communities manage water
resources as common property or have access to water as a commonly shared
public good even today, privatization of water resources is gaining momentum.
p25
John Locke's treatise on property effectively legitimized the theft of the
commons in Europe during the enclosure movements of the 17th century. Locke,
son of wealthy parents, sought to defend capitalism-and his family's massive
wealth-by arguing that property was created only when idle natural resources
were transformed from their spiritual form through the application of labor:
"Whatsoever, then, he removes out of the state that Nature hath provided and
left in it, he hath mixed his labor with it, and joined to it something that is
his own, and thereby makes it his property." Individual freedom was dependent
upon the freedom to own, through labor, the land, forests, and rivers. Locke's
treatises on property continue to inform theories and practices that erode the
commons and destroy the earth.
p33
Modern industrial papermaking and leather processing create massive pollution.
Pulp uses 60,000 to 190,000 gallons of water per ton of paper or rayon.
Bleaching uses 48,000 to 72,000 gallons of water per ton of cotton. Packaging
green beans and peaches for long-distance trade can use up to 17,000 and 9
4,800 gallons per ton, respectively.
The overuse and pollution of scarce water resources is not restricted to old
industrial technologies; it is a hidden component of the new computer
technologies. A study by South West Network for Environmental and Economic
Justice and the Campaign for Responsible Technology reveals that the process of
chip manufacturing requires excessive amounts of water.
On average, processing a single six-inch silicon wafer uses 2,275 gallons of
de-ionized water, 3,200 cubic feet of bulk gases, 22 cubic feet of hazardous
gases, 20 pounds of chemicals, and 285 kilowatts hours of electrical power. In
other words, if an average plant processes 2,000 wafers per week (the new
state-of-the-art Intel facility in Rio Rancho, New Mexico, for example, can
produce 5,000 wafers per week) it would need 4,550,000 gallons of water per
week and 236,600,000 gallons ~ per year for wafer production alone.
The study finds that out of the 29 Superfund sites in Santa Clara County,
California, 20 were created by the computer industry.
p34
The Principles of Water Democracy
At the core of the market solution to pollution is the assumption that water
exists in unlimited supply. The idea that markets can mitigate pollution by
facilitating increased allocation fails to recognize that water diversion to
one area comes at the cost of water scarcity elsewhere.
In contrast to the corporate theorists who promote market solutions to
pollution, grassroots organizations call for political and ecological
solutions. Communities fighting high-tech industrial pollution have proposed
the Community Environmental Bill of Rights, which includes rights to clean
industry; to safety from harmful exposure; to prevention; to knowledge; to
participation; to protection and enforcement; to compensation; and to cleanup.
All of these rights are basic elements of a water democracy in which the right
to clean water is protected for all citizens. Markets can guarantee none of
these rights.
There are nine principles underpinning water democracy:
1. Water is nature's gift
We receive water freely from nature. We owe it to nature to use this gift in
accordance with our sustenance needs, to keep it clean and in adequate
quantity. Diversions that create arid or waterlogged regions violate the
principles of ecological democracy.
2. Water is essential to life
Water is the source of life for all species. All species and ecosystems have a
right to their share of water on the planet.
3. Life is interconnected through water
Water connects all beings and all parts of the planet through the water cycle.
We all have a duty to ensure that our actions do not cause harm to other
species and other people.
4. Water must be free for sustenance needs
Since nature gives water to us free of cost, buying and selling it for profit
violates our inherent right to nature's gift and denies the poor of their human
rights.
Water is limited and exhaustible if used nonsustainably. Nonsustainable use
includes extracting more water from ecosystems than nature can recharge
(ecological nonsustainability) and consuming more than one's legitimate share,
given the rights of others to a fair share (social nonsustainability).
6. Water must be conserved
Everyone has a duty to conserve water and use water sustainably, within
ecological and just limits.
7. Water is a commons
Water is not a human invention. It cannot be bound and has no boundaries. It is
by nature a commons. It cannot be owned as private property and sold as a
commodity.
8. No one holds a right to destroy
No one has a right to overuse, abuse, waste, or pollute water systems.
Tradable-pollution permits violate the principle of sustainable and just use.
9. Water cannot be substituted
Water is intrinsically different from other resources and products. It cannot be
treated as a commodity.
p43
The United States ... produces 25 percent of the world's greenhouse gases, more
than any other nation, has officially announced that it will make no cutbacks.
p54
John Widtsoe, an irrigation scientist with the Bureau of Reclamation:
The destiny of man is to possess the whole earth; and the destiny of the earth
is to be subject to man. There can be no full conquest of the earth, and no
real satisfaction to humanity, if large portions of the earth remain beyond his
highest control. Only as all parts of the earth are developed according to the
best existing knowledge, and brought under human control, can man be said to
possess the earth. The United States ... might accommodate its present
population within its humid region, but it would not then be the great nation
that it now is.
p55
By the late 1890s, Los Angeles had already tapped its local supplies and city
officials were secretly purchasing land and water rights in neighboring Owens
Valley. In 1907, bonds were issued to finance a 238-mile aqueduct that would
divert the eastern runoff of the Sierra Madre. This clandestine agreement to
transfer water from the farms to the city led to intense conflict between Owens
Valley residents and Los Angeles water users. "Non-local residents were equipped
with private and public investment and backed by the might of the army. In 1924,
Owens Valley residents blasted an aqueduct to prevent water diversion to Los
Angeles." The water war had begun.
After 12 more blasts, armed guards were stationed on the aqueduct with orders to
kill. In 1926, the Saint Francis Dam was built, but it broke soon after, killing
400 people. During the' drought of 1929, groundwater pumping began but quickly
dried up the 75-square mile Owens Lake. New scarcity had bred new conflicts. In
1976, the aqueduct was bombed again.'
Irrigation in the western United States was spurred by the need to provide food
for gold-rush miners. By 1890, 3.7 million acres of land were irrigated. But by
1900, many water companies were facing bankruptcy, and public agencies were
providing support to private developers. Water projects continued to be driven
by the private sector but financed by public investments.
The Hoover Dam on the Colorado River was commissioned by the Bureau of
Reclamation during the Great Depression and was completed in 1935. The
726-foot-high dam used 66 million tons of concrete-enough to build a
16-foot-wide highway from New York to San Francisco. The reservoir, Lake Mead,
could hold the river's entire flow for two years.
The dam marked the beginning of the large dam era and the partnership between
government and corporations in control over water. Six companies-Henry Kaiser,
Bechtel, Morrison-Knudson, Utah Construction, MacDonald Kahn, J. F. Shea, and
Pacific Bridge-were awarded the bid for the dam. The Colorado River Compact,
which approved the dam, excluded local governments and communities from the
negotiations and decisions. Native Americans, who had been living in the
Colorado River basin for centuries, were completely shut out of the decision to
dam the river. As historian Donald Worster observes, "No one asked [Native
Americans] to participate in the Colorado Compact negotiations, and the Bureau
of Indian Affairs, supposedly their guardian angel, failed to look out for
their interests there." Arizona, which considered the dam a theft of the
state's natural resources, refused to ratify the compact.
To this day, the primary beneficiary of the Hoover Dam has been California. In
fact, the state leads the world in water consumption. Water from the Hoover Dam
is transferred to California through a 242-mile aqueduct from the Colorado
River, and nearly a third of the hydropower generated by the dam is used to
pump water to the state. Although it accounts for a mere 1.6 percent of the
243,000-square-mile Colorado basin, California uses one-fourth of its water.
Much of this goes to big farms.
Large water-diversion projects are said to augment water. In reality, they take
water from one community to another and from one ecosystem to another. The
expansion of irrigated agriculture in the and American west has come at the
cost of agriculture in the eastern and southern parts of the country. Although
cotton cultivation on lands irrigated by the Bureau of Reclamation increased by
by Vandana Shiva
South End Press, 2002
Destruction of water resources and of forest catchments and aquifers is a form
of terrorism. Denying poor people access to water by privatizing water
distribution or polluting wells and rivers is also terrorism. In the ecological
context of water wars, terrorists are not just those hiding in the caves of
Afghanistan. Some are hiding in corporate boardrooms and behind the free trade
rules of the WTO, North American Free Trade Agreement (AFTA), and Free Trade
Area of the Americas (FTAA). They are hiding behind the privatization
conditionalities of the IMF and World Bank. By refusing to sign the (Kyoto
protocol, President Bush is committing an act of ecological terrorism on
numerous communities who may very well be wiped off the earth by global
warming. In Seattle, the WTO was dubbed the "World Terrorist Organization" by
protestors because its rules are denying millions the right to a sustainable
livelihood.
Greed and appropriation of other people's share of the planet's precious
resources are at the root of conflicts, and the root of terrorism. When
President Bush and Prime Minister Tony Blair announced that the goal of the
global war on terrorism is the defense of the American and European "way of
life," they are declaring a war against the planet-its oil, its water, its
biodiversity. A way of life for the 20 percent of the earth's people ~ who use
80 percent of the planet's resources will dispossess 80 percent of its people
of their just share of resources and eventually destroy the planet. We cannot
survive as a species if greed is privileged and protected and the economics of
the greedy set the rules for how we live and die.
The ecology of terror shows us the path to peace. Peace lies in nourishing
ecological and economic democracy and nurturing diversity. Democracy is not
merely an electoral ritual but the power of people to shape their destiny,
determine how their natural resources are owned and utilized, how their thirst
is quenched, how their food is produced and distributed, and what health and
education systems they have.
p1
Although two - thirds of our planet is water, we face an acute water shortage.
The water crisis is the most pervasive, most severe, and most invisible
dimension of the ecological devastation of the earth. In 1998, 28 countries
experienced water stress or scarcity. This number is expected to rise to 56 by
2025. Between 1990 and 2025 the number of people living in countries without
adequate water is projected to rise from 131 million to 817 million. India is
supposed to fall into the water stress category long before 2025.
A country is said to be facing a serious water crisis when available water is
lower than 1,000 cubic meters per person per year. Below this point, the health
and economic development of a nation are considerably hampered. When the annual
water availability per person drops below 500 cubic meters, people's survival
is grievously compromised. In 1951, the average water availability in India was
3,450 cubic meters per person per year. By the late 1990s, it had fallen to
1,250 cubic meters. By 2050, it is projected to fall to 760 cubic meters. Since
1970, the global per capita water supply has declined by 33 percent. The decline
does not result from population growth alone; it is exacerbated by excessive
water use as well. During the last century, the rate of water withdrawal has
exceeded that of population growth by a factor of two and one-half.
p15
Market assumptions are blind to the ecological limits set by the water cycle and
the economic limits set by poverty. Over-exploitation of water and disruption of
the water cycle create absolute scarcity that markets cannot substitute with
other commodities. The assumption of substitution is in fact central to logic
of commodification. For example, economist Jack Hirshleifer and his colleagues
state:
This is not to deny that as a commodity, water has its special features, for
example, its supply is provided by nature partly as a store and partly as a
flow, and it is available without cost in some locations but rather expensive
to transport to others. Whatever reason we cite, however, the alleged unique
importance of water disappears upon analysis.
Such abstract arguments miss the most crucial point - when water disappears,
there is no alternative. For Third World women, water scarcity means traveling
longer distances in search of water. For peasants, it means starvation and
destitution as drought wipes out their crops. For children, it means
dehydration and death. There is simply no substitute for this precious liquid,
necessary for the biological survival of animals and plants.
The water crisis is an ecological crisis with commercial causes but no market
solutions. Market solutions destroy the earth and aggravate inequality. The
solution to an ecological crisis is ecological, and the solution for injustice
is democracy. Ending the water crisis requires rejuvenating ecological
democracy.
p20
With globalization and privatization of water resources, new efforts to
completely erode people's rights and replace collective ownership with
corporate control are under way. That communities of real people with real
needs exist beyond the state and the market is often forgotten in the rush for
privatization.
p21
As natural rights, water rights are usufructuary rights; water can be used but
not owned. People have a right to life and the resources that sustain it, such
as water. The necessity of water to life is why, under customary laws, the
right to water has been accepted as a natural, social fact.
p24
Parading as the anonymous market, the rich and powerful use the state to
appropriate water from nature and people through the prior-appropriation
doctrine. Private interest groups systematically ignore the option of community
control over water. Because water falls on earth in a dispersed manner, because
every living being needs water, decentralized management and democratic
ownership are the only efficient, sustainable, and equitable systems for the
sustenance of all. Beyond the state and the market lies the power of community
participation. Beyond bureaucracies and corporate power lies the promise of
water democracy.
... Water is a commons because it is the ecological basis of all life and
because its sustainability and equitable allocation depend on cooperation among
community members. Although water has been managed as a commons throughout human
history and across diverse cultures, and although most communities manage water
resources as common property or have access to water as a commonly shared
public good even today, privatization of water resources is gaining momentum.
p25
John Locke's treatise on property effectively legitimized the theft of the
commons in Europe during the enclosure movements of the 17th century. Locke,
son of wealthy parents, sought to defend capitalism-and his family's massive
wealth-by arguing that property was created only when idle natural resources
were transformed from their spiritual form through the application of labor:
"Whatsoever, then, he removes out of the state that Nature hath provided and
left in it, he hath mixed his labor with it, and joined to it something that is
his own, and thereby makes it his property." Individual freedom was dependent
upon the freedom to own, through labor, the land, forests, and rivers. Locke's
treatises on property continue to inform theories and practices that erode the
commons and destroy the earth.
p33
Modern industrial papermaking and leather processing create massive pollution.
Pulp uses 60,000 to 190,000 gallons of water per ton of paper or rayon.
Bleaching uses 48,000 to 72,000 gallons of water per ton of cotton. Packaging
green beans and peaches for long-distance trade can use up to 17,000 and 9
4,800 gallons per ton, respectively.
The overuse and pollution of scarce water resources is not restricted to old
industrial technologies; it is a hidden component of the new computer
technologies. A study by South West Network for Environmental and Economic
Justice and the Campaign for Responsible Technology reveals that the process of
chip manufacturing requires excessive amounts of water.
On average, processing a single six-inch silicon wafer uses 2,275 gallons of
de-ionized water, 3,200 cubic feet of bulk gases, 22 cubic feet of hazardous
gases, 20 pounds of chemicals, and 285 kilowatts hours of electrical power. In
other words, if an average plant processes 2,000 wafers per week (the new
state-of-the-art Intel facility in Rio Rancho, New Mexico, for example, can
produce 5,000 wafers per week) it would need 4,550,000 gallons of water per
week and 236,600,000 gallons ~ per year for wafer production alone.
The study finds that out of the 29 Superfund sites in Santa Clara County,
California, 20 were created by the computer industry.
p34
The Principles of Water Democracy
At the core of the market solution to pollution is the assumption that water
exists in unlimited supply. The idea that markets can mitigate pollution by
facilitating increased allocation fails to recognize that water diversion to
one area comes at the cost of water scarcity elsewhere.
In contrast to the corporate theorists who promote market solutions to
pollution, grassroots organizations call for political and ecological
solutions. Communities fighting high-tech industrial pollution have proposed
the Community Environmental Bill of Rights, which includes rights to clean
industry; to safety from harmful exposure; to prevention; to knowledge; to
participation; to protection and enforcement; to compensation; and to cleanup.
All of these rights are basic elements of a water democracy in which the right
to clean water is protected for all citizens. Markets can guarantee none of
these rights.
There are nine principles underpinning water democracy:
1. Water is nature's gift
We receive water freely from nature. We owe it to nature to use this gift in
accordance with our sustenance needs, to keep it clean and in adequate
quantity. Diversions that create arid or waterlogged regions violate the
principles of ecological democracy.
2. Water is essential to life
Water is the source of life for all species. All species and ecosystems have a
right to their share of water on the planet.
3. Life is interconnected through water
Water connects all beings and all parts of the planet through the water cycle.
We all have a duty to ensure that our actions do not cause harm to other
species and other people.
4. Water must be free for sustenance needs
Since nature gives water to us free of cost, buying and selling it for profit
violates our inherent right to nature's gift and denies the poor of their human
rights.
Water is limited and exhaustible if used nonsustainably. Nonsustainable use
includes extracting more water from ecosystems than nature can recharge
(ecological nonsustainability) and consuming more than one's legitimate share,
given the rights of others to a fair share (social nonsustainability).
6. Water must be conserved
Everyone has a duty to conserve water and use water sustainably, within
ecological and just limits.
7. Water is a commons
Water is not a human invention. It cannot be bound and has no boundaries. It is
by nature a commons. It cannot be owned as private property and sold as a
commodity.
8. No one holds a right to destroy
No one has a right to overuse, abuse, waste, or pollute water systems.
Tradable-pollution permits violate the principle of sustainable and just use.
9. Water cannot be substituted
Water is intrinsically different from other resources and products. It cannot be
treated as a commodity.
p43
The United States ... produces 25 percent of the world's greenhouse gases, more
than any other nation, has officially announced that it will make no cutbacks.
p54
John Widtsoe, an irrigation scientist with the Bureau of Reclamation:
The destiny of man is to possess the whole earth; and the destiny of the earth
is to be subject to man. There can be no full conquest of the earth, and no
real satisfaction to humanity, if large portions of the earth remain beyond his
highest control. Only as all parts of the earth are developed according to the
best existing knowledge, and brought under human control, can man be said to
possess the earth. The United States ... might accommodate its present
population within its humid region, but it would not then be the great nation
that it now is.
p55
By the late 1890s, Los Angeles had already tapped its local supplies and city
officials were secretly purchasing land and water rights in neighboring Owens
Valley. In 1907, bonds were issued to finance a 238-mile aqueduct that would
divert the eastern runoff of the Sierra Madre. This clandestine agreement to
transfer water from the farms to the city led to intense conflict between Owens
Valley residents and Los Angeles water users. "Non-local residents were equipped
with private and public investment and backed by the might of the army. In 1924,
Owens Valley residents blasted an aqueduct to prevent water diversion to Los
Angeles." The water war had begun.
After 12 more blasts, armed guards were stationed on the aqueduct with orders to
kill. In 1926, the Saint Francis Dam was built, but it broke soon after, killing
400 people. During the' drought of 1929, groundwater pumping began but quickly
dried up the 75-square mile Owens Lake. New scarcity had bred new conflicts. In
1976, the aqueduct was bombed again.'
Irrigation in the western United States was spurred by the need to provide food
for gold-rush miners. By 1890, 3.7 million acres of land were irrigated. But by
1900, many water companies were facing bankruptcy, and public agencies were
providing support to private developers. Water projects continued to be driven
by the private sector but financed by public investments.
The Hoover Dam on the Colorado River was commissioned by the Bureau of
Reclamation during the Great Depression and was completed in 1935. The
726-foot-high dam used 66 million tons of concrete-enough to build a
16-foot-wide highway from New York to San Francisco. The reservoir, Lake Mead,
could hold the river's entire flow for two years.
The dam marked the beginning of the large dam era and the partnership between
government and corporations in control over water. Six companies-Henry Kaiser,
Bechtel, Morrison-Knudson, Utah Construction, MacDonald Kahn, J. F. Shea, and
Pacific Bridge-were awarded the bid for the dam. The Colorado River Compact,
which approved the dam, excluded local governments and communities from the
negotiations and decisions. Native Americans, who had been living in the
Colorado River basin for centuries, were completely shut out of the decision to
dam the river. As historian Donald Worster observes, "No one asked [Native
Americans] to participate in the Colorado Compact negotiations, and the Bureau
of Indian Affairs, supposedly their guardian angel, failed to look out for
their interests there." Arizona, which considered the dam a theft of the
state's natural resources, refused to ratify the compact.
To this day, the primary beneficiary of the Hoover Dam has been California. In
fact, the state leads the world in water consumption. Water from the Hoover Dam
is transferred to California through a 242-mile aqueduct from the Colorado
River, and nearly a third of the hydropower generated by the dam is used to
pump water to the state. Although it accounts for a mere 1.6 percent of the
243,000-square-mile Colorado basin, California uses one-fourth of its water.
Much of this goes to big farms.
Large water-diversion projects are said to augment water. In reality, they take
water from one community to another and from one ecosystem to another. The
expansion of irrigated agriculture in the and American west has come at the
cost of agriculture in the eastern and southern parts of the country. Although
cotton cultivation on lands irrigated by the Bureau of Reclamation increased by
- AMERICAN LIFE UNDER A NATIONAL ID CARD —Tom DeWeese, Wed Sep 21 01:27
Message Board by American Patriot Friends Network [APFN]
