<\/p>\n
Illustration by Simon Letch<\/span>Credit: <\/span> <\/cite><\/p>\n The Murray-Darling Basin covers about a seventh of Australia\u2019s land mass: most of NSW, all the Australian Capital Territory, much of Victoria, and parts of Queensland and South Australia. It covers the Murray and Darling rivers, plus all their many tributaries, including the Murrumbidgee.<\/p>\n You could call it the nation\u2019s biggest food bowl, underpinning the livelihoods of 2.6 million people and producing food and fibres worth more than $24 billion a year. Vast amounts of water are extracted from the rivers to supply about 3 million people, including those in Adelaide, but particularly for irrigating farms.<\/p>\n It\u2019s also a living ecosystem that depends on interconnected natural resources. About 5 per cent of the basin consists of floodplain forests, lakes, rivers and other wetland habitats. Like all our rivers, the Murray-Darling is subject to recurring droughts and flooding.<\/p>\n Over the past century, however, the extraction of water, especially for irrigation, has reduced water flows to the point where the system can no longer recover from these extreme events.<\/p>\n Federal Environment and Water Minister Tanya Plibersek has announced a brave new plan to rescue the Murray-Darling rescue plan.<\/span>Credit: <\/span>Alex Ellinghausen\/Janie Barrett<\/cite><\/p>\n Over the past decade, millions of fish have perished in mass die-offs, toxic algae have bloomed, wildlife and waterbird numbers have declined and wetlands have dried up.<\/p>\n Efforts to reverse the river system\u2019s decline began with big-spending announcements by John Howard and his environment minister Malcolm Turnbull before the election they lost in 2007. It took five years before Julia Gillard and Tony Burke reached agreement with the basin states on a plan to restore the river system.<\/p>\n Under the then $13 billion plan, 3200 billion litres a year would be returned to the rivers, largely by buying back water entitlements from willing farmers. But the plan\u2019s been modified several times and in 2015 the feds decided to cease buying back entitlements. Both the NSW and Victorian governments had been persuaded by their farmers to oppose buybacks.<\/p>\n NSW and Victoria have not delivered on their promise to reach agreements with riverside landowners to allow bought-back water to spill out of river channels onto floodplain wetlands. Another problem has been farmers drawing more water than their entitlement.<\/p>\n The buybacks have stalled at 2100 billion litres a year, even though the planned 3200 billion litres is probably too little to counter the evaporation caused by global warming. The plan had been due to be completed by June next year, with a new agreement in 2026.<\/p>\n But, in the 2022 election campaign, Anthony Albanese promised to revive the scheme and buy back the remaining water needed to meet the 3200 billion-litre target, and last week Plibersek announced a new deal with all the states, bar Victoria.<\/p>\n She agreed to another two or three years to deliver the remaining water, more options to deliver it, more funding to pay for it and more accountability by the feds and other governments to deliver on their obligations.<\/p>\n But she will need the support of the Greens and independents to get the new deal through the Senate. The opposition won\u2019t support the resumption of buybacks, whereas the Greens don\u2019t like the extra time to be taken.<\/p>\n Of course, even if the legislation goes through, there\u2019s no guarantee the various governments will do what they\u2019ve committed to. The feds are doing what the feds always have to do to get the states\u2019 co-operation \u2013 offer them more money \u2013 but Victoria and NSW will always be tempted to keep their own farmers and river towns on side, which remain strongly opposed to buybacks.<\/p>\n How can it be so hard to ensure the continued survival of such an important river system? To say that, without remedial action, the rivers could shrink to a chain of billabongs is no great exaggeration. That might not happen for 50 years but, the way climate change seems to be accelerating, it could be a lot sooner.<\/p>\n You\u2019d think the people who\u2019d see this most clearly were those who stand to lose most as the rivers continue to shrivel. But, no, myopia prevails.<\/p>\n Take some pain now to avoid catastrophe later? No way! You can keep all the city-slickers\u2019 tax money you want to pay us to help us adjust. We\u2019re betting it will never happen. In any case, I\u2019ll be dead by then.<\/p>\n And politicians who will take the votes of people who\u2019d prefer to self-destruct aren\u2019t hard to find. Reminds me of the way things are in the Land of the Free.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n