The agricultural benefits of salinity control on the Red River of Texas and Oklahoma

Abstract

Salinity of the waters from the Red River and its major tributaries has virtually eliminated its use for irrigation of agricultural crops in Texas and Oklahoma. A chloride control project has been proposed whereby the source salt waters will be captured and diverted to storage facilities. The purpose of this study was to estimate the net direct benefits to agricultural producers attributable to the proposed salinity control project. Further, estimates of project costs, municipal and industrial benefits and benefits from improving the water in Lake Kemp were obtained to complete a benefit-cost analysis. The procedure used to estimate agricultural benefits was to use a FORTRAN program to develop initial tableaus of a recursive linear programming model representing agricultural production in the study area. Alternative scenarios involving profit maximizing behavior on the part of producers, current cropping patterns, and with and without SAR crop yield effects were developed to provide a range of benefit estimates. The basis for benefit evaluation was to use parameters prescribed by the U.S. Water Resources Council's Principles and Standards and recent proposed changes along with those developed in this study to estimate the increase in net returns to producers in the study area between a with project and a without project condition for a 100 year period of analysis. Benefits were discounted to their present value with discount rates of 7 1/8 percent and 3 1/4 percent for comparative purposes. Benefits estimated herein were used in conjunction with external estimates of project costs and other benefits to evaluate the economic feasibility of the salinity control project. In all scenarios considered, cotton emerged as the major irrigated crop. Scenarios involving profit maximizing behavior on the part of producers resulted in benefit estimates of over $65 million and $117 million without and with SAR crop yield effects, respectively, at the 7 1/8 percent discount rate...