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 The U.S. Department of Agriculture and the National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration will lead the initiative, which grew out
of a series of regional forums held in response to the 2012 drought,
the most severe and widespread in more than 70 years. It covered
more than two-thirds of the continental U.S. and caused more than
$30 billion in losses from crop failures, wildfires and other ripple
effects.
"We were very aggressive in responding to the drought but all of it
was after the fact," Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said in an
interview with The Associated Press. "We made money available for
technical assistance after the fact. We provided disaster loan
assistance and extended grazing aid after the fact. We purchased
surplus product after the fact."
With droughts likely to become more frequent and widespread as the
climate warms, "we have to adjust to this new normal and we have to
understand what it means to be proactive instead of just reacting,"
he said.
Vilsack was announcing Friday the creation of the National Drought
Resilience Partnership, which also will involve the Department of
Interior, the Department of Energy, the Environmental Protection
Agency, the Army Corps of Engineers and the Federal Emergency
Management Administration. The goal is to help communities and
individual farmers, ranchers and others whose livelihoods are
particularly vulnerable during low-water periods to be ready and
cope.
"We want to harness the federal government's best tools and science
and get that information out there ... so we can say to people
earlier, 'Hey, drought is on the way. Let's discuss options where we
can help,'" said Jason Weller, chief of the USDA's Natural Resources
Conservation Service.
In 2014, the partnership will focus on developing a one-stop website
where people will be able to find information scattered across the
vastness of the bureaucracy — often "bits and pieces in some nook
and cranny" of a database that many people don't know exists, said
Kathryn Sullivan, NOAA's acting administrator. The government has
a website, www.drought.gov, which provides links to some material on
drought conditions, weather outlooks and available resources. The
new site will be more extensive — with information on a wide variety
of topics, from best-management practices for farmers to the latest
scientific findings on a plant's water cycle, and user-friendly ways
of determining what data is needed and how to find it, officials
said.
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Also next year, each agency in the partnership will designate one
official as the go-to person whom state and local officials can
contact for information and assistance during droughts.
The partnership also will select one place in the West that has been
hit hard by drought for a test case in developing a locally tailored
"drought resistance plan" that could serve as a model for other
communities, Vilsack said.
Another 2014 project will be upgrading the network that monitors
soil moisture content, a crucial drought forecasting tool. The
Natural Resources Conservation Service will improve its information
collection techniques to better help farmers decide which crops to
plant or determine how to graze livestock based on local conditions,
Vilsack said.
"If you're a manager of an irrigation district or a municipal water
system, you're going to get more timely and accurate forecasts as to
what future water availability will be so you can manage your
overall water supply," Weller said.
Soil moisture is difficult to measure over wide areas, requiring
numerous sensors and measurements, Sullivan said. Experiments are
underway with satellite technology that could improve the system.
[Associated
Press; JOHN FLESHER, AP Environmental Writer]
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