The 2020 anomaly - a white lands planting spike on the eve of the SGMA

Part 2 of 10 in a series on the almond and pistachio sectors in California. Download a complete report here and explore the underlying data in a standalone application here.

In our previous post, we showed that California almond plantings have collapsed from their 2016 peak. But the decline was not smooth. 2020 stands out as an anomaly.

Total almond plantings in 2020 were approximately 119k acres (~48k ha). This was well below the 2016 peak of 136k (~55k ha), but still a substantial year. What was unusual was where those acres went.

Roughly 30% of all almond acres planted in 2020 were outside irrigation districts, compared to a long-run average of about 22%. In absolute terms, nearly 36k acres (~15k ha) of almonds were planted in white lands that year. This was more than any other year in the dataset, which spans four decades. The following year, 2021, the outside-district share was similarly elevated at 29%.

By 2022, the outside-district share had reverted to the historical norm of around 22%, where it has remained since. The spike was concentrated in 2020 and 2021.

Share of almonds and pistachio plantings outside irrigation districts. Source: Demeter

What happened?

The timing is hard to ignore. The Sustainable Groundwater Management Act (SGMA), enacted in 2014, required Groundwater Sustainability Agencies (GSAs) in critically overdrawn basins to submit their Groundwater Sustainability Plans by January 2020, with medium- and low-priority basins following by 2022. The 2020 planting spike was spread broadly across many GSAs rather than concentrated in one or two locations, which suggests a widespread pattern of behaviour rather than a single large project skewing the data.

The planting was also notable in light of almond market conditions. In 2020, almond prices had begun a decline that would see them fall to multi-year lows. Growers were planting aggressively on white lands - land outside irrigation districts, at a moment when both the economic signals and the regulatory trajectory pointed toward caution.

From a supply perspective, these 2020-vintage plantings are now approaching their productive years in basins where groundwater sustainability plans are being implemented. They represent a cohort of orchards that were established late, in locations facing increasing water constraints.

The contrast with pistachios is instructive. Pistachio planting in 2020 was also robust - roughly 34k total acres (~14k ha) - but the outside-district share was 19%, close to the historical norm and well below the almond figure. Pistachio growers were planting at similar volumes but were not disproportionately targeting white lands in the same way.

Next in this series: Two crops, two responses - how almonds and pistachios diverged

You can download a complete report here.