Farmers warn of water shortages: 'There will be less food and it will be more expensive'

Water shortages are a phenomenon that has already come to Greece. Farmers and livestock breeders are demanding immediate help from the state.

As Yiannis Vagos, a farmer from Boeotia, explains, water losses are high due to old irrigation networks. “The problem is that no matter how much water we produce, 90% of it is lost in earthen canals. For example, in Thessaly and Kopaida, if we supply 10 liters of water for irrigation, 1 reaches the field, so we ask for closed irrigation systems,– he explained. – When we say that a nightmare year is coming, they are not addressing the real problems of the primary sector. The fact is that there is little water, and if it runs out, agriculture will perish. If someone doesn't take agricultural policy seriously, our country will have no future. Water is the alpha and omega for animals and plants”.

He noted that farmers and residents receive water from the Ilika River, and a tenth of it ends up on the fields. “Less than 3% ends up in a closed system, – he concluded. – We hope to get out of the nightmare we live in before the time comes.”

In turn, the President of the Federation of Livestock Breeders of Thessaly, Dimitris Balukas, stressed the need to create reservoirs to collect water: “This needs to be done for two reasons. Of course, it is very important to have water reserves and in cases like last year's Cyclone Daniel, it is also considered necessary to hold back the water through major infrastructure works so that in the subsequent rains we do not face floods like last September, – he noted. – Livestock breeders in Thessaly and all of Greece are faced with a huge problem – the plague virus. Situation is under partial control, and we hope to get out of this nightmare as soon as possible.”

Pavlos Satolias, a livestock farmer and president of the National Union of Agricultural Cooperatives from Kalavryta, expressed the same sentiment: “There is a serious problem, we will have less and more expensive products. We need new technologies and also for farmers to find new varieties that are more resistant to drought and high temperatures.”

“If the state does not understand and make bold investments to save water using modern methods, it is unthinkable that we will not have reservoirs. They retain water and enrich the subsoil, – he said. – Now it is too late to “pull it out”, now we need to think not about preserving the environment, but about feeding our people.”

P.S. Instead of squandering the allocated money, enriching friends and relatives through the budget of the Ministry of Climate Change, we need to address issues of collecting water from the reservoir, lining (at least with film) the walls of irrigation canals, mass introduction of drip irrigation and other methods of water conservation, following the example of Israel.

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