USDA Issues Report on Irrigation Groundwater Management

Posted by Brian Sparks|April 21, 2023

The shared nature of many groundwater resources means that pumping by one irrigator affects water availability for nearby irrigators. The connectivity among irrigators pumping from the same aquifer—paired with growing concerns about groundwater depletion—led to the creation of many of the groundwater organizations currently active in the U.S.

A new report issued by USDA’s Economic Research Service, “Irrigation Organizations: Groundwater Management,” is the third report in a series of economic briefs on key topics related to irrigation organizations using data collected in the USDA’s 2019 Survey of Irrigation Organizations (SIO). This report summarizes information from the SIO about organizations that influence on-farm groundwater use.

Here are a few key findings from the report:

In some regions, such as the U.S. High Plains, nearly all groundwater-fed irrigated acreage occurs within the service area of a groundwater organization. In other regions, such as the Southeast, a relatively small share of the groundwater-fed irrigated acreage is under the purview of a groundwater organization.
The most common management functions of groundwater organizations are monitoring groundwater conditions, collecting pumping data, charging pumping or water rights fees, and permitting well development.
Groundwater organizations report that the most important sources of information for long-term planning decisions are groundwater monitoring data, output from groundwater models, long-term weather forecasts, and reservoir storage reports.

Click here to access the full report.