Drought: All four Hawaii counties designated as agriculture disaster areas

HONOLULU—Don’t let this morning’s rain fool you. Today, U.S. Department of Agriculture Secretary Thomas Vilsack designated all four Hawaii counties as agricultural disaster areas due to losses caused by this year’s drought.

The recently completed October 2009 through April 2010 Hawaii wet season, or hoolio, ranks as the driest in the past 30 years and one of the driest in the past 55 years, the National Weather Service said. The finding is based on an average of wet season rainfall rankings from seven reporting stations across the state with continuous records.

Existing agricultural drought in the eastern half of the state worsened particularly in the Kona, Kau, and leeward Kohala sections of Hawaii Island since the development of an El Nino last summer.

Impacts to agricultural operations span a wide range of sectors including livestock, coffee, and ornamental flowers. Residents depending on rainfall water catchments to meet basic needs were also hit expecially hard.

The five driest October to April wet seasons over the last 30 years are:

1. 2009 to 2010
2. 1997 to 1998
3. 1991 to 1992
4. 1980 to 1981
5. 1999 to 2000

Lack of rainfall is not the only factor contributing to the impacts of drought, according to the State Commission on Water Resource Management. Both natural events and human activities, such as expanding populations, irrigation, and environmental needs all put pressure on water supplies. Lack of rainfall combined with the demands society place on on water systems and supplies contribute to drought impacts.

During the past 15 years, the most severe droughts impacting the Hawaiian Islands have been associated with the El Niño Phenomenon and persistent zones of high pressure systems throughout the islands. Another danger associated with the impacts of drought is the heightened potential of wildland fires during extended dry periods.

Lack of rainfall and reduced irrigation water supplies can cause reduced yields, crop failure, and force farmers to delay planting or risk losing their crop. Drought can destroy pasture and deplete drinking water for livestock. Ranchers are forced to purchase feed and water and reduce herd sizes to cope with drought.

A Secretarial disaster designation makes farm operators and producers in both primary and contiguous counties eligible to be considered for Farm Service Agency emergency loans and the Supplemental Revenue Assistance Program. The Farm Service Agency will consider each emergency loan application on its own merit by taking into account the extent of losses, security available, and repayment ability.

Farmers in eligible counties have eight months from the date of the Secretarial disaster declaration to apply for emergency loan assistance.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture also reminds island ranchers that the Livestock Indemnity Program (LIP) remains available for producer losses.

The “Food, Conservation, and Energy Act of 2008” authorized LIP to provide benefits to livestock producers for livestock deaths in excess of normal mortality caused by adverse weather that occurred on or after Jan. 1, 2008, and before Oct. 1, 2011, including losses because of hurricanes, floods, blizzards, disease, wildfires, extreme heat, and extreme cold. The livestock death losses must have also occurred in the calendar year for which benefits are being requested.

LIP provisions are similar to other livestock indemnity programs implemented in recent years except that an owner or contract grower’s livestock do not have to be located in a county or contiguous county designated a natural disaster by the president or declared by the U.S. secretary of agriculture. Under the current LIP, an owner or contract grower’s livestock payments will be based on individual producers’ losses.

To be eligible for LIP, a livestock producer must have legally owned the eligible livestock on the day the livestock died.

For more information on these federal programs, contact your county USDA Farm Service Agency office: