Op-Ed By Mary Alice Murphy

Who is all of us? "Us" includes humans, animals, reptiles, birds, fish and plants.

As all of you know, at the top of the food chain are we humans. We are the producers of the world. We produce food to feed us. What do we need to produce vegetative food, other than seeds and soil? Water. We humans also drink that water, and use it in other manners of production, such as the production of energy, including renewable energy.

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, in its Agriculture and Consumer Protection Department, agrees that water is a finite resource that is not equitably distributed throughout the world.

You learned in biology class that the finite resource of water has a hydrological cycle that acts as a great water pump linking lakes, rivers, soil moisture, and biological systems to the rain and snow that falls each year, according to http://www.fao.org/docrep/u8480e/U8480E0c.htm . About 113,000 cubic kilometers of water fall as rain and snow every year. It is the ultimate in recycling.

The vast majority of the world's water is salt water at 97.5 percent. Of the remaining 2.5 percent, most is locked away as groundwater or in glaciers. Agricultural production, which utilizes the largest amount of fresh water, has been using water to irrigate crops since the ancient Egyptians used the surface waters of the Nile River to produce food.

We all like to eat. Would you want to have to scavenge for all your food? Or have you become accustomed to producing some yourself in your backyard and going to the grocery store for the rest? You need water to produce that backyard food and so do commercial growers.

The problem here in southwest New Mexico is that we live in a somewhat arid land, although not as arid as many other countries of the world.

We may think that the Americas, North and South, use a great deal of water in irrigation, but according to the above website, Asia, by far uses the most agricultural water.

We may think that groundwater can suffice for agricultural use and for municipal and domestic use, but according to this same report, "Even countries with greater supplies are extracting too much from their underground water reserves. The water table under Beijing is sinking by 2 metres every year, while Bangkok's has fallen by 25 metres since the 1950s. The level of the vast Ogallala aquifer, which lies beneath eight US states, is dropping by nearly 1 metre a year."

Another part of this report states: "A world short of water is also an unstable world. More than 200 river systems cross international boundaries, and 13 rivers and lakes are shared by 96 countries. Over-use or pollution by countries upstream can be devastating for those downstream. Access to water, particularly in areas where rainfall is low or erratic, is becoming a major political issue and vital to national interests.

"Faced with these crises, the world must learn to be less wasteful and to manage its water resources better," the report continues. "Methods include conserving supplies, using reservoirs and small dams to catch runoff, recharging aquifers, protecting watersheds and recycling waste water in agriculture and industry."

I expect that many of you conserve water in your homes, if only to keep water bills as low as possible.

To tell a personal story: When I was a child of about 7 or 8 years old, our well ran dry. That made a huge impression on me, because we had to go to our neighbor's house down the road and haul water back to our house until we could have our well drilled deeper. In later years, because of highly mineralized water out of that same well, my mother had to drink bottled water, although her water was safe for bathing and washing clothes and dishes. I learned to make the most of every bit of water coming out of the faucets.

When we lived in a foreign, fairly arid country, with running water only twice a day, for an hour in the morning and an hour and a half in the evening, I learned lessons on recycling a set amount of water for various uses. I could wash dishes and clothes in sequence, using the same water. Ask me and I'll explain my system. I don't want to have to do it again, but I will if I must.

When we moved to Silver City, knowing that the aquifers were iffy at best for domestic wells, we chose to live in a semi-rural area served by Silver City municipal water wells, but we like to keep our water bills as low as we can.

Water is necessary for all life, as delineated in the first paragraph above.

If each one of us humans is conserving the water we use, and I agree that many are not, then the second choice to manage water resources better, according to the above report is "using reservoirs and small dams to catch runoff."

The Arizona Water Settlement Act gives us that choice, as well as that of alternatives. It allocates an annual, average 14,000 acre-feet from the Gila and San Francisco rivers to store and use for agricultural, municipal, domestic and industrial use. The Act also at least partially funds that storage and conservation with up to $128 million, although that number may have dropped, due to low interest rates for the past several years.

You may have agreed that you do not want to have to scavenge or grow all your food. Do you appreciate the electricity that runs your lights, your washer and dryer, your stove? Some of that electricity, including the renewable types, preferred by some of us, requires water.

There is much talk about food security and insecurity. Without water, that food insecurity will increase to untenable levels.

Do you want to continue to draw down the aquifers so that one day every one of us (or our descendants) must rely on surface water for all our needs? If so, we hope those small dams and reservoirs exist to catch that water.

Do you want to plan now for the future of your children and grandchildren or would you think it best to leave it to them? I don't think that's fair, and I suspect most readers wouldn't think so, either.

Similar in time to the AWSA, in the 1930s, studies were being conducted on possible storage for water allocated in the Rio Grande Basin to share water among Colorado, New Mexico and Texas. In the 1950s because of growing population in the Rio Grande Corridor, including Albuquerque, plans moved forward again, with construction beginning in 1964. Albuquerque has been paying for use of the water since the completion of the diversion tunnel, completed in 1978. Albuquerque began using that water just a few years ago. This project was much more complex than what is being proposed for the southwest New Mexico region.

Don't we want to have the same progressive planning that these forwarding-looking people had?

As for the benefits of utilizing and storing the AWSA water, humans would be better assured of having enough water for their crops, to provide for themselves and food to sell to others to feed them and their families.

But what about the animals, reptiles, birds and fish? Small dams and reservoirs would be landing and resting places for the birds on their migratory journeys. Fish would live in the reservoirs, and be food for themselves, animals, birds and humans.

Water from the storage reservoirs could be released at intervals to keep the rivers wet, providing water for riparian areas, reptiles, fish and birds. Endangered species might have the possibility of recovering to sustainable numbers, with a wet river and healthy riparian areas.

Let's use the water that we have a one-time opportunity to use—for ourselves, our descendants and the eco-system. Let's let our Interstate Stream commissioners know that we want to store this water for present and future use.

Editor's Note: This editorial is strictly the opinion of this editor. It is influenced only by her life experiences and her own opinions.