"It ripples
through the entire economy": Climate change costs cotton farmers billions
BY JANET SHAMLIAN, CHRIS LAIBLE
NOVEMBER
3, 2022 / 7:57 PM / CBS NEWS
Lubbock,
Texas —
Many tractors and other farm equipment are sitting idle across Texas as the
cotton harvest season gets underway. Climate change is threatening the $7
billion industry.
"Never
has it ever been this bad," said Ricky Yantis, a fourth-generation farmer
in west Texas.
The
region produces more than a third of the nation's cotton. Yantis has just 168
acres of healthy plants on his 6,000 acres — less than 3% of his land.
"Where
our harvest nearly normally lasts a month, month and half, it will last a
day," he said.
Extreme
drought and a sustained summer heatwave taking an unprecedented toll. Farmers
like Yantis had to plow fields without irrigation because plants were burning
up. Statewide, almost 70% of cotton crops were similarly abandoned.
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