This is somewhat my point. It should not be that hard to have some checks on the water use of the industry. E.g. you could create laws for certain especially water-hungry industries, you could ban certain water intensive agriculture alltogether (e.g. avocados) etc.

Some of those measures could be permanent (given the fact that it is going to get worse) others could be limited to especially dry years/seasons.

Regulating water use in a friggin' desert is common sense. How much worth is a culture when it cannot even reach that low bar of rationality?