Maize
Footnotes:
[1] Manzoor Qadir, “Agricultural Use of Marginal-Quality Water: Opportunities and Challenges. In D. Molden, (Ed.), Water for Food, Water for Life: A Comprehensive Assessment of Water Management in Agriculture” (Routledge, 2007), http://ideas.repec.org/p/iwt/bosers/h040204.html.
[2] Kirsten J. Johnson, “‘Do As The Land Bids.’ A Study Of Otomi Resource-Use On The Eve Of Irrigation” (ProQuest Dissertations and Theses, Clark University, 1977).
Together with alfalfa, maize represents the most prolific crop in the Mezquital Valley. The near century of wastewater agriculture has provided a unique circumstance in which to study the long-term impact on soil structure, fertility, and plant relations. While alfalfa and other fodder crops feed nitrogen back into the soil, even one rotation of maize planting depletes nutrients at a rapid rate. [1] The relationship between large agroindustry and small farmers is an equally extractive one. Farmers have little choice about what crops to plant between government restrictions on vegetables and agroindustry demand for maize. These dynamics trace back through the power and control implicit to both the irrigation and land tenure systems. A farmer’s succinct description from over fifty years ago still rings true today. “A village in the next valley got irrigation a few years ago, and it let the government put in a collective orchard on its land. The government fenced the land, leveled it with the machine, built the irrigation ditches, and planted the trees. They are mostly pecans which are very expensive. The people couldn’t pay for it. The bank lent them a lot of money. Now they have to wait for the trees to grow.” [2]
Footnotes:
[1] Manzoor Qadir, “Agricultural Use of Marginal-Quality Water: Opportunities and Challenges. In D. Molden, (Ed.), Water for Food, Water for Life: A Comprehensive Assessment of Water Management in Agriculture” (Routledge, 2007), http://ideas.repec.org/p/iwt/bosers/h040204.html.
[2] Kirsten J. Johnson, “‘Do As The Land Bids.’ A Study Of Otomi Resource-Use On The Eve Of Irrigation” (ProQuest Dissertations and Theses, Clark University, 1977).
