The water permits were recently revoked: <a href="https://ktar.com/story/5487088/arizona-revokes-water-permits-for-saudi-arabia-owned-alfalfa-farm/" rel="nofollow">https://ktar.com/story/5487088/arizona-revokes-water-permits...</a>
It is wild to me that we still frame stories like this in such an openly xenophobic way. Your opinions on the Saudis should not matter. The nationality of the farm owner is completely irrelevant to the issue. Growing water intensive plants in the middle of the desert is stupid and bad even if 100% of the profit goes to Americans.
> In fact, the state rents some land to Fondomonte for $25 an acre. The company can then pump unlimited amounts of groundwater for essentially no cost.<p>There's no justification for this.<p>What makes it worse is that Saudi Arabia already has what it needs to terraform itself and make its own deserts agriculturally productive in an ecological way. They're just not doing it. Instead, they're working with the government of Arizona to make Arizona look like Saudi Arabia. For $25 an acre.
Wow I cannot even fathom the amount of hypocrisy here. If it’s so important there should be regulations about this and NO ONE should be able to do draw any amount of water as they please. However time and time again certain political party has fought for deregulation and have always allowed their cronies to do whatever they want as long as money greased the hands. It’s cute how ppl are finding it outrageous that a legally leased land with all the proper instruments in place is somehow ‘violating’ something…
> Fondomonte trucks haul <i>dried</i> alfalfa off the property it uses and ships it back to the Middle East to feed cattle. According to Mayes, cows in Saudi Arabia are essentially drinking Arizona water.<p>The above statement makes no sense. If cows are consuming <i>dried</i> alfalfa, how are they <i>drinking?</i>