Mark Arax, an award-winning journalist and author of books chronicling agriculture and water issues in California’s Central Valley, will provide the keynote talk at an international groundwater conference next month. The event, Toward Sustainable Groundwater in Agriculture: The 3ʳᵈ International Conference Linking Science & Policy, returns to San Francisco June 18-20 for the first time since 2016 and will highlight advances on sustaining groundwater in agricultural regions across California and around the world. Arax, author of The Dreamt Land, West of the West and The King of California, is from a family of Central Valley farmers. He is praised for writing books that are deeply profound, heartfelt and nuanced. He will do a reading from his latest book The Dreamt Land and comment on the future of groundwater in the Valley during his keynote lunch talk on June 18.