Return to TFB Main Page
Return to Current Edition
Texas Agriculture Archive

May 3, 2002

Valley farmers meet
with State Department

Two Texas farmers took their battle over Mexico's failure to comply with a 58-year-old water treaty to the nation's capital April 24, and met with a high-ranking official of the U.S. State Department.

Mike England and Brian Jones, both farmers in Hidalgo County of the Rio Grande Valley, met with Otto Reich, Assistant Secretary of State for the Western Hemisphere, to discuss Mexico's refusal to honor the terms of the U.S./Mexico Water Treaty of 1944. Following that meeting, both England and Jones met at length with Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, Congressman Ruben Hinojosa and Congressman Solomon Ortiz on the water issue.

Mexico has not met the terms of the treaty since 1992. Economic analysis shows that the combination of drought and Mexico's refusal to honor the treaty has cost Valley agriculture some $400,000,000 per year since 1996.

Jones and England are both members of the Texas Farm Bureau, which asked Hutchison to arrange the meeting. England said that he was glad to finally discuss the problem with someone who has the power to help. "At least they've now put a problem with a face," he said.

Jones agreed, " You could tell, that despite our efforts to tell this story for six years, this was the first time they have heard just how desperate things are for Rio Grande Valley agriculture."

The treaty obligates Mexico to allow 350,000 acre-feet of water to flow into the Rio Grande annually. Under the terms of the treaty, the U.S. must allow 1.5 million-acre feet to flow from the Colorado River into Mexico. The U.S. has honored the treaty, while Mexico now owes a water deficit of some 1.4 million-acre feet.

England suggested that reluctance on the part of the U.S. government to enforce the treaty might be due to a policy of preserving good relations with Mexico.

"If that's the case," England said, "we need financial assistance, and we need it very soon." Both farmers said a short-term solution would be a "paper transfer" of between 100,000 and 150,000 acre-feet of water from the Mexican water account to that of the U.S. entities. That, Jones said, would provide some time to work out a long-term solution, but he stressed that the transfer should occur within the next week to 10 days.

"We are running out of time," Jones said.

England said "many truckloads" of Mexican onions are crossing the border, depressing prices for Valley farmers at the height of the onion season.

"They are using our water to grow those onions, and shipping them here to compete with us," he said.

Donald Patman, president of the Texas Farm Bureau, in a recent letter to members of the Texas Congressional delegation, called for actions to be taken against Mexico if they do not honor the treaty. Patman suggested these actions might include compliance language in pending U.S.-Mexico legislation, Congressional inquiry into the U.S. State Department's inability to force resolution, withholding water obligated to Mexico from the Colorado River and embargo of Mexican imports.

"We are grateful to Senator Hutchison and to the members of Congress from the Valley area, for their assistance in getting Brian and Mike a hearing in the State Department," Patman said of the meeting. "Agriculture in the Valley is in deep trouble, and much of it has to do with our neighbor to the south not honoring its commitments."

Texas Commissioner of Agriculture Susan Combs, Ray Prewett of Texas Citrus Mutual, and Joe Maley, Director of Organization for Texas Farm Bureau, also participated in the meeting with Reich.