irrigation

Senator Joyce should comment on the impact of landscape-scale bulldozing of native ground cover and natural land features during the construction of cotton farms and other broad-acre irrigation enterprises, when he calls for damming of the Balonne River in Queensland, in response to the St George floods.

The continuing campaign, by Federal Opposition Senator Barnaby Joyce, to dam the Balonne River, ostensibly to mitigate the impact of flooding around St George, has been criticised by environmental and public water-rights advocacy group, Fair Water Use (Australia).

Coordinator of Fair Water Use, Ian Douglas, responded today, “If the Senator is genuine in his desire to reduce flooding, he should first call for the demolition of inappropriately sited and unregulated levees, constructed by irrigating agribusinesses in the Darling catchment, including one seven metres high which runs for many kilometres next to the Balonne on the cotton property of Cayman Islands-based Eastern Australia Agriculture, just downstream from St George.”

“We would also like Senator Joyce to comment on the impact of landscape-scale bulldozing of native ground cover and natural land features, during the construction of cotton farms and other broad-acre irrigation enterprises, which has effectively removed the natural barriers to surface-water flows in the upper Darling catchment, especially in the St George area”, he added.

“Damming the Balonne would certainly increase water holdings, to the likely benefit of local irrigating agribusinesses, leading to further degradation of the Darling river system during non-flood periods”, Dr Douglas concluded.

Source:
Media Release, 5th May 2011

Murray Darling Basin Authority (MDBA) – independent authority or rubber stamp?

Over the last decade, the Murray-Darling Basin Authority and its predecessor the Murray-Darling Basin Commission have been hamstrung by the National Water Initiative, which is promoting the privatisation of Australia's water: to the joy of speculators and the dismay of those who understand the need to promote wise and sustainable use of the nation's water.

MDBA – independent authority or rubber stamp?

News that neither the Federal Environment Minister nor the new Chair of the Murray-Darling Basin Authority are willing to endorse current members of the MDBA board will come as no surprise to many Australians, according to a statement released by public water rights and environmental advocacy group, Fair Water Use (Australia):

“The Federal Government has clearly been backed into a corner by the partisan and occasionally outrageous behaviour of those who view water as a private commodity rather than an invaluable common resource which must be managed carefully for all Australians.

There is little doubt that the pressure tactics of maverick sections of the irrigation lobby, and corporate players increasingly investing in Australian water, have already precipitated the resignations of the previous Chair and one board member, both possessing a wealth of experience in environmental matters - and it is highly likely that more resignations will follow.

Over the last decade, the Murray-Darling Basin Authority and its predecessor the Murray-Darling Basin Commission have been hamstrung by the National Water Initiative, which is promoting the privatisation of Australia's water: to the joy of speculators and the dismay of those who understand the need to promote wise and sustainable use of the nation's water.

There are serious concerns that we are witnessing the final stages of the shameful rebadging of the Authority from guardian of the Murray-Darling to a mere rubber stamp for politically expedient, cynical policies which will only promote continuation of the overexploitation of the nation’s most vital river system.

It is entirely unacceptable that Australians have been deprived of their democratic right to determine whether this country’s water is protected as a common good or treated as a commodity to be traded on global financial markets.”

Source: Media Release from Fair Water Use, 7th March 2011

Time to come clean on the real costs of water

The original case for Labor's controversial $1 billion food bowl upgrade was rejected by state cabinet because the government's promised water savings could not be achieved for the price tag of $1 billion, it has been revealed. Premier John Brumby has continued to tell Victorians that the savings could be made, despite not having any proof that they were achievable.

Already the project has identified 650 of the system's 6300 kilometres of channels for rationalisation, or downsizing.

Farmers claim millions of dollars of taxpayer funds are being wasted through the installation of unnecessary meters and other irrigation infrastructure on properties that have no use for them.

(cotton seeds being fed to cattle due to drought - source: wikimedia commons)

In April 2009, the Premier told Parliament: It has always been the basis of this project that there would be at least 225 gigalitres of water savings.
According to Plug the Pipe, the truth of the matter is that the pipeline has provided a mere 16.7 billion litres. That translates to a piddling 1% of Melbourne’s current water supply. So far it has only delivered 22% of the proposed 75 Gigalitres water and with only 139 days left available for pumping, the absolute maximum that can now be delivered is 58 billion litres.

To add injury to insult, the desalination plant costs rise to $5.1 billion, and $200 million a year to run. Average annual water bills soon to be $3000!

Cuts to irrigation farmers

Farmers have slammed an independent report that says Murrumbidgee and Murray irrigators should make big sacrifices to help revive the Murray-Darling Basin. The cut would drain at least $2.7 billion out of the basin's economy, however the scientists say the pain would not be shared equally across the basin's 18 catchments. In most catchments, the required reduction is less than 10%.

However, in two catchments - the Murray and Murrumbidgee - the reductions are significantly greater, in the order of 39% and 65% respectively.

The Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists' report proposes that the Murrumbidgee and Murray regions have their water caps cut by 65 and 39 per cent respectively. 

The Wentworth group recommend to restore environmental flows:

1 Restore and maintain all major rivers and flood plains in the Murray-Darling Basin in a healthy condition;

2 Manage the Coorong and Lower Lakes as a healthy functioning river estuary; and

3 Improve or maintain the health of wetlands of national and international significance.

Cost of saving the Rivers' Health

In late 2006 the ongoing drought in the Murray-Darling Basin combined with a lack of action on the implementation of the National Water Initiative highlighted the need for a clear statement on the reality of Australia's water predicament.  According to the group, We built our modern Australian economy in a period of much higher rainfall and we assumed that it would keep on raining. But it hasn’t.

(Wentworth-Marray darling rivers source: wikimedia commons)

Scientists for the Murray Darling Basin Authority say the cost of saving the river's health will be a $2.7 billion drop in profits from communities throughout the basin - a drop of 26¢ for every dollar in the Murrumbidgee catchment and 12¢ for Murray communities.

The Murray-Darling is a floodplain river system. However, the Basin is under enormous stress as a result of past water-allocation decisions, prolonged drought, natural climate variability and emerging climate change. A lack of water and the absence of natural flooding are having a significant impact on many key environmental assets - rivers, streams, wetlands, forests, floodplains and billabongs. 

The Living Murray program was established in 2002 in response to evidence showing the declining health of the River Murray system. It is a partnership of the Australian, NSW, Victorian, South Australian and ACT governments.  The River Murray is currently experiencing its lowest in-flows on record and periods of drought need to be considered in delivering The Living Murray program.

We face a real risk that the ecosystems supporting the river system will collapse, undermining the businesses and communities that depend on it.

The best-available science suggests there is a substantial risk that a working river will not be in a healthy state when key system level attributes of the flow regime are reduced below two-thirds of their natural level. It selected water from the least profitable activities in each catchment so that the required volume of environmental water could be obtained at the lowest economic cost.

Wetlands and economic threats

The Australian Conservation Foundation estimates as much as 90 per cent of all floodplain wetlands in the Murray Darling Basin having been lost or severely degraded. The agricultural economy of the Murray-Darling Basin earns $9 billion a year in export income. Without the Murray-Darling Basin wetlands and rivers, the great productive base of our agricultural bread basket would not exist.

To achieve a level of two-thirds natural flow in all the catchments of the Basin the environment’s share of the existing Cap on diversions would need to be increased by approximately 4,400GL. This represents a reduction of approximately 40% of the current Cap on diversions.

Dairy farmers need constant rain to ensure regular milk production. It is dairy and their fodder crops that have been consuming most of our irrigation water.  Australia’s milk production is enormous, and with good prices available overseas, much of it is exported. About 600 litres is used to produce a litre of milk.  The Murray-Darling food bowl has been upholding our economy for a long time.

President of the NSW Irrigators Council Col Thomson said the report should be disregarded because there would be some areas that probably almost cease to exist.  So easy just to dismiss wetland, river systems and a life-support system?

Melbourne's water storages

Water storages supplying Melbourne are 32.7 per cent full compared with 26.3 per cent at the same time last year, meaning dams are holding an extra 126 billion litres.  However, water restrictions have been eased!

When the drought was at its worst a pipeline was conceived to bring water from the State's North to Melbourne but recent wet weather, continuing water restrictions and the revelation the city has enough water for two years without rain has some questioning the project.

The protest group, Plug the Pipe has been most vocal in opposing the project. It says people, particularly farmers in the North of the State, are having their water rights taken away in favour of Melbourne's gardens.  Someone should be pointing out how we have been forced to build a $5 billion desalination plant because we forgot about water.  In Melbourne's population explosion, the Brumby government forgot about water so they've had to make the north-south pipeline over the hills to steal water from the bush!

 It is all about politics, not logic or caution. We cannot be addressing climate change and water shortages while we are heavily dependent on unsustainable dairy industries and exports. However, it seems that producing food is a minor industry compared to the building industries and property development, supported by swelling numbers of city people who obviously pay more taxes and contribute more to the economy!

United Nations Report

Energy and Agriculture Top Resource Panel's Priority List for Sustainable 21st Century is a new and hard-hitting report concludes that dramatically reforming, re-thinking and redesigning two sectors-energy and agriculture-could generate significant environmental, social and economic returns. The report prepared by the International Panel for Sustainable Resource Management, have reviewed all the available science and conclude that two broad areas are currently having a disproportionately high impact on people and the planet's life support systems-these are energy in the form of fossil fuels and agriculture,
especially the raising of livestock for meat and dairy products.

Agricultural goods, particularly products from animals, which are fed more than half of all world crops. Agricultural production accounts for 70% of the global freshwater consumption and 38% of the total land use. Food production accounts for 19% of the world's greenhouse gas emissions and 60% of the phosphorus and nitrogen pollution and 30% of toxic pollution in Europe;

Distilled is the monthly newsletter produced by the National Water Commission, the government-appointed national body ostensibly responsible for "driving progress towards the sustainable management and use of Australia's water resources" - a gloriously vacuous aspiration, even by institutional standards. An extract from the current issue is revealing:

"Stakeholders urge more action on water reform:

Water industry stakeholders have urged the Commission to continue to fearlessly identify areas where further and faster reforms are needed to get water reform "back on track". The Commission's stakeholder forum has underscored the importance of collaboration as part of a renewed commitment to national water reform by all governments, industry partners and private sector stakeholders."

Water privatisation agenda dominates 'commission'

Cursory inspection of the membership of the National Water Commission's 2009 Stakeholder Forum reveals a clear predominance of groups, governmental and private, which, behind the scenes, are passionately pushing the water-privatisation agenda.

Australian citizens excluded from representation on Commission

Moreover, notable by their absence in the extensive list of entities considered to be worthy of forum membership are groups representing Australian citizens, or customers - the term most of the members would no doubt prefer to use.

Thankfully however, in the cities and on the land, communities Australia-wide are increasingly aware that the definition of "reform" has been corrupted by those advocating removal of water from public control and by the accompanying flotilla of large-scale investors who view our water as a tradeable commodity rather than a vital national resource.

Fair Water Use demands that, collectively and individually, the current membership of the NWC Stakeholder Forum ceases hiding behind the banner of "water reform", states their position on water privatisation and explains to all Australians precisely what “track” they would like to “get back on”.

MEDIA RELEASE: 6th June 2009 from Fair Water Use Australia [email protected]