> but there's dam water at very cheap prices and obviously, for these products it's required

So yeah, an example of the government coming in and ensuring cheap water for this crop production at the expense of those downstream. You agree, if the government didn't artificially and massively change the hydrology of the area, this industrial level wouldn't really be economically possible. This can make sense and not be terribly destructive depending on the region.

I and the poster above were probably talking about the American Southwest. In this case, its even more extreme. Old land owners got the rights to flood their fields from the river water and dig massive canals to turn extremely arid deserts green. They get the right to have that water for free, forever, because the government gave them the land at one point in time in the past and allowed for that taking based on deeply flawed hydrological models. They use that for agricultural products sold worldwide, including growing alfalfa for Saudi Arabia in the deserts of Arizona[0]. The government won't go in and actually start putting restrictions or calling back their grants to that water allocations, and its resulting in environmental catastrophe for many parts of the region.

[0] https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/in-drought-stricken-ar...