More than four dozen of the 900 Hmong farmers in Fresno County say the five-year California drought is affecting their operations, mostly by drying up the wells they need to water their crops, says the Sacramento Bee. The refugees from Southeast Asia account for the bulk of the 1,500 small farms in the county and most of them earn a modest income from their rented land, so there is no easy solution.
Chongyee Xiong camps out on the nine acres that he rents, waking every three hours to begin watering a different part of his vegetable fields. He draws water from a shallow well, so there is not enough water pressure or volume to irrigate all of his crops at the same time. He planted only six of his nine acres because of the limited water supply. “Farming is like gambling,” Xiong told the Bee. “You never know if you’re going to hit the jackpot.”
Ruth Dahlquist-Willard, small farms advisor with the University of California Cooperative Extension, says the Hmong farmers “are the first to go in the drought” because they are on rented land, often with older irrigation pumps and shallow wells. Because they are renters, they need to persuade owners to invest in new wells. Some owners would rather sell to housing developers or switch to higher revenue crops, such as almonds, that they can grow themselves. And because the Hmong farmers often pay in cash, they lack the bookkeeping records that bankers or the USDA expects when farmers seek a loan to improve their property.