By all accounts， including Spain's major farm lobbies， farmers use 80 percent of the country's water resources. Many farmers are blamed from tapping illegal wells in some of the most arid farm regions that allow them to take water for free. By some estimates， there are as many as 1.5 million wells.
Further stretching their resources， farmers are now focused on higher yields， in part to answer to globalized competition. Olives were once grown as an arid crop. Today， even olive groves are irrigated to induce more production.
Urban consumers-and Spain enjoys good citizen response to water cutbacks-pay for their water and are increasingly online to receive water from desalination plants， a dependable water supply. Water consumption experts point out that residential and industrial users， including hotels and golf courses， see desalinated water as a reasonable option and have been willing to pay the price……
Critics believe economic favoritism has allowed the farm industry to refuse desalinated water and continue to tap illegal wells. The political cost of forcing farmers to pay， by many accounts， is deemed too high. "Nobody has ever been able to confront the farmers，" said on analyst.
Water experts said Spain is now in the middle of rethinking its water policy and trying to divine how to use both desalination and water transfer from the Ebro to coordinate equitable acce3ss to water.
"The drought actually has been helpful，" said Damia Barcelo， director of a Catalan-based water institute. "There's a recognition that we can't talk about one source or one solution anymore."
Word
Lobby （n） a group of people who try to persuade the government to take action that is to their advantage.
Online （adj） referring to something that is in progress or becoming active
Desalination plants （n phr） a factory that removes salt from sea water in order to produce drinkable water
Divine （v） to discover something
Equitable （adj） fair and reasonable； treating everyone in the same way.
Further stretching their resources， farmers are now focused on higher yields， in part to answer to globalized competition. Olives were once grown as an arid crop. Today， even olive groves are irrigated to induce more production.
Urban consumers-and Spain enjoys good citizen response to water cutbacks-pay for their water and are increasingly online to receive water from desalination plants， a dependable water supply. Water consumption experts point out that residential and industrial users， including hotels and golf courses， see desalinated water as a reasonable option and have been willing to pay the price……
Critics believe economic favoritism has allowed the farm industry to refuse desalinated water and continue to tap illegal wells. The political cost of forcing farmers to pay， by many accounts， is deemed too high. "Nobody has ever been able to confront the farmers，" said on analyst.
Water experts said Spain is now in the middle of rethinking its water policy and trying to divine how to use both desalination and water transfer from the Ebro to coordinate equitable acce3ss to water.
"The drought actually has been helpful，" said Damia Barcelo， director of a Catalan-based water institute. "There's a recognition that we can't talk about one source or one solution anymore."
Word
Lobby （n） a group of people who try to persuade the government to take action that is to their advantage.
Online （adj） referring to something that is in progress or becoming active
Desalination plants （n phr） a factory that removes salt from sea water in order to produce drinkable water
Divine （v） to discover something
Equitable （adj） fair and reasonable； treating everyone in the same way.