Table of Contents
Environmental & Conservation Balance Sheet for The California Rice Industry
Introduction to the Balance Sheet
The California Rice Commission wishes to assess the environmental and conservation "net worth" of the California rice industry. This assessment primarily involves on-farm activities to produce rice, and excludes marketing, processing, and consumption. The assessment consists of an environmental balance sheet in the Executive Summary and supporting information in nine chapters.
The environmental and conservation net worth of the rice industry is evaluated on the basis of current conditions, trends, and industry investment associated with:
- The influence of rice farming on the environment
- Natural resource demands for rice farming
- Environmental and conservation stewardship
The intent of the balance sheet is two fold:
- To document the level of environmental and conservation stewardship associated with rice farming.
- To help identify opportunities for the industry to benefit the environment.
The balance sheet executive summary is purposefully brief, so that the major conclusions can be understood at a glance by the reader. The ratings are necessarily subjective. However, the basis for each rating is thoroughly documented in the informative chapters that follow.
The chapters describe the many and often innovative ways rice farmers work to make a profit, comply with regulatory requirements, and conserve, protect, and even enhance natural resources that are influenced by farming operations. Rice farmers' successes in meeting natural resource management challenges are presented, as well as ongoing challenges that face them.
The chapters were written to be understandable to readers who are neither rice farmers nor environmental scientists. Each chapter addresses a major environmental and conservation issue and the impacts of rice farming. Additional reference materials are cited in most of the chapters to facilitate more in-depth review by the reader.
