ABC NEWS 03/30/15
By Nikolai Beilharz

Drought in California in the United States is now in its fourth year, and some environmental groups say there is not enough political momentum and interest to address the problem.

The water shortage has organisations like Climate Nexus, a not-for-profit group focusing on climate change, concerned.

The group’s director of media strategy Michael Shank said that there was a lack of political will to push for large scale reform, like that seen in Australia and the Murray-Darling Basin.

“The drought in California is terribly serious, but unfortunately it hasn’t risen to national party level yet,” he said.

“You’re seeing some of the chatter coming out of Washington D.C., as it tries to raise the profile of what will be an ongoing drought.

“The next world war, if you want to call it that, will inevitably be about water. We’ll see that in the US, legally now, and hopefully not physically in the future.

“There isn’t the appetite I’d hope for, but I think it will be the agricultural community ultimately that steps up and says ‘our survival is at stake.'”