I guess the other states won't miss the 13 billion dollars worth of food that we export.
http://ajed.assembly.ca.gov/sites/a...acts on California's Agricultural Economy.pdf
Personally, I don't mind having a brown lawn, now that it has become socially acceptable.
And by the way, I don't begrudge the use of my federal tax dollars for flood relief in Texas, etc.
Things are not exactly as you and the ag industry paint them. Although there are huge amounts of ag grown in CA, and distributed outside the state, it's not all carrots and peas.
The major export 'crop' in CA is grapes. Namely - wine grapes, although table grapes and raisin grapes are certainly there:
"the sales value generated by California agriculture
increased by 3.2 percent between the 2011 and 2012
crop years. The State’s 80,500 farms and ranches
received a record $44.7 billion for their output, up from the
$43.3 billion received in 2011.
California’s increase in
revenue was led by the grape industry followed by the cattle
sector and almond production, respectively.
Grape production generated $4.45 billion in cash receipts in
2012, up 15 percent from the previous record high received in
2011.
2013, and 2014 were even higher grape receipts. So, making wine, and selling wine from grapes counts as an ag export. Ok.
Next, the states were not the greatest consumers of the exports. The majority of the CA ag exports went to foreign countries like Canada, and China. Nothing wrong with that, I encourage it, but frankly, most states can do without CA ag exports pretty well. I do love me some Driscoll srawberries from Oxnard/Ventura though, would miss those if the production from CA was gone. Yup.
Texas ranks lower in gross ag exports, but then again, we don't export wine grapes except maybe a token, small amount. Not much call for TX wine grapes I guess. I think most folks see CA as a rich source of ag products, but knowing a little about the water waste, it seems they can do a bit better with some hydroscaping, and other conservation methods.
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