ABSTRACT
The tremendous impact of climate on food production can be moderated—and in some cases virtually eliminated—by applications of environmental control. Sunlight is the ultimate energy source for all food production. The state of California grows a large part of most American foodstuffs, yet the build-up of salt in the soil is said to affect half of its crop lands to one extent or another. Perhaps the most obvious of all, the growing of food using seawater instead of fresh water is in many ways extraordinarily difficult to utilize in modern production systems. The Americans put in a diversion canal to drain the worst of the saline water around the Mexicali region, but it was no panacea and the Mexicans remained quite vexed at their loss of land and food production. Vegetable production is prodigious, and little fresh water is necessary, as the humid atmosphere reduces plant evapotranspiration to a fraction of what it would be in the open desert.
