Don’t ignore basin plan review

It will form the basis for what the Murray-Darling Basin Plan two will contain going forward.

Invitations to consultations are being received by stakeholders as we speak.

The first, that Andrew Mann and I, in our capacities as co-chairs of the Goulburn Murray Irrigation District Water Leadership Forum, have been invited to, is in Sydney on Monday, February 16 and there is a tentative date for further consultation with local stakeholders on April 16 in Shepparton.

No doubt there will be many others across the northern and southern basin.

The Murray-Darling Basin Plan, enacted in 2012, followed major water reforms on the back of the Millennium Drought and a new Water Act 2007.

Its stated aims were to restore ecological health while balancing agriculture, communities and the environment within the basin.

Key provisions included setting Sustainable Diversion Limits to manage water extraction, water recovery targets to address over-allocation, and a Sustainable Diversion Limit Adjustment Mechanism for flexible water management.

The plan related to both the northern and southern basins, but by far the greater amount of water recovery, mainly though buybacks, took place in the southern basin, and Victoria did much of the heavy lifting in this regard.

Back when the first basin plan was being constructed there were protest meetings across the basin and the draft plan was burned in the streets of Griffith.

We are not yet seeing much reaction in relation to the prospect of the second basin plan, but initially there was a sense that with all the water recovered so far there may at least be an appetite by government to spend that water wisely rather than simply take the approach that adding water through more buybacks will fix the problems.

The fact that the Lower Murray has been listed as critically endangered by the Federal Government from the confluence of the Darling River and the Murray through to its mouth would suggest that the Murray-Darling Basin Plan has not achieved what it set out to do.

Its timing, immediately before the release of the discussion paper, should concern northern Victorian food-producing communities.

The plan has certainly changed the face of agriculture in northern Victoria and southern NSW and had the effect of hollowing out many small communities as a direct result of water buybacks and resulting land use changes.

There is always so much to say on this topic, but the purpose of my letter is to raise awareness that we are now moving into a consultative phase which will determine what the future of the next Murray-Darling Basin Plan will look like.

I urge everyone in our northern Victorian communities to take notice of the discussion paper and better understand what the Federal Government has in mind for us.

I fear little thought has been given to what the future of agriculture in our country should look like in these precarious global times.

While other countries are focusing on shoring up their domestic production and resilience, we have no obvious policy to ensure this in our own country.

The diversity in food production that has always been a feature of the Goulburn Murray Irrigation District and led to the major investment in modernising the irrigation district.

In times of global turbulence, we need more than cotton, almonds and wheat as staple products.

The continuance of dairy, horticulture and more specialised food production should be regarded as essential.

Let’s make all of this part of the discussion as we go forward.

– Suzanna Sheed

GMID Water Leadership Forum co-chair and former independent Member for Shepparton District in the Victorian Parliament 2014-2022