by Matthew Weaver, Capital Press
Crops in the Columbia Basin Project are valued at $2.66 billion each year, or roughly $3,800 per acre, according to a recent study from the three irrigation districts within the federal project.
The report estimates an additional $2.671 billion as the estimated value of animal and food processing production reliant on project crops.
The new report updates a 2010 study on the economic value of the project, said John O'Callaghan, secretary-manager of the South Columbia Basin Irrigation District in Pasco, Wash.
"The (project) is an economic engine, churning away producing things that society requires at a fundamental level — food, fiber, economic opportunities, social opportunities, recreational opportunities, and fish and wildlife habitat — and will continue to do so well into the future," O'Callaghan told the Capital Press.
The South, East and Quincy Columbia Basin irrigation districts commissioned the study.
"The asset that is the Columbia Basin Project is taken for granted — from the food we eat to the jobs we hold, to the places we call home or our playground," said Sara Higgins, executive director of the Columbia Basin Development League, which advocates for project completion. "These things wouldn't exist without the (project). That's significant enough to pay attention to, understand, support, maintain and grow."
The project was authorized by Congress to irrigate 1,029,000 acres, but to date, the infrastructure of reservoirs and canals irrigates about 700,000 acres in portions of Grant, Adams, Franklin and Walla Walla counties, with some land in Lincoln County authorized but not yet receiving water, according to the league.
Funding is the biggest need to complete the Odessa Groundwater Replacement Program, reinvest in aging infrastructure and overall completion of the project, Higgins said.
"The value of the (project) is compromised if a declining aquifer prevents continued production at current rates," she said. "Completion of the (project) will increase the value of its contributions, not only economically, but also in areas like food security and sustainability."
The project is not directly dependent on the Snake River dams compared to inland agriculture, O'Callaghan said. But transportation, energy and agribusiness systems are complex and inter-related, he said, "in ways that are hard to understand until they stop functioning."
"For example, it is tempting to say that because CBP wheat may not be barged through the dams, that we don’t rely on those dams for transporting wheat from the project," he said. "But if that barging capacity were to go away suddenly, I suspect we would witness a large adverse ripple effect throughout other means of transporting commodities from the project. All of us have seen some of these kinds of counterintuitive disruptions to the larger supply chain over the last couple of years."
The irrigation districts and league will share the updated data with stakeholders and policy makers, Higgins said.
