FINDING THE SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT BALANCE: Forestry and the Environment

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FINDING THE SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
BALANCEForestry and the Environment

• Dr Neil Byron
• Productivity Commission

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Mountains
Town
City
Sea
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I D
Town
Major Storages
Irrigation District
PD
Irrigation District
City
Private Diverter
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State Border
I D
Town
Irrigation District
Return flows
PD
ID
City
Private Diverter
Delta wetlands
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Groundwater the Third Dimension
I D
State Border
Town
Irrigation District
PD
ID
City
Private Diverter
To Groundwater
Delta wetlands
Bores
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State Border
I D
Town
Farm Dams
Irrigation District
Drainage Diverter
PD
ID
City
Private Diverter
To Groundwater
Delta wetlands
Bores
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Land use change
State Border
I D
Town
?
Farm Dams
Irrigation District
?
?
New crop?
PD
?
ID
Recycle plant?
City
?
Private Diverter
To Groundwater
Delta wetlands
?
Bores
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Situation?

• System is seriously overstretched
• Increasing demand for
• Urban water
• Expansion of existing or new crops
• Restoration of environmental assets
• (rivers, wetlands, riparian floodplains)

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Situation (cont)

• Meanwhile, decreased inflows to river system
• More interception of overland flows
• More and bigger farm dams
• Land use/vegetation change in catchments
• Much greater groundwater extraction
• Greater Stock Domestic usage
• Greater technical efficiency in irrigation, which
  reduces return flows and groundwater recharge
• All compounding a long-term trend of declining
  rainfall!
• Largely unregulated, unmeasured and unpriced

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Possible Solutions?

• Reduce losses by infrastructure works
• Increase technical efficiency in irrigation
• Control farm dams and interception
• Restrict water-intensive landuses upstream
  (trees) or ban specific crops (rice, cotton)
• Build new dams, pipelines or de-salination plants
  or recycling to supply townsfolk
• Ration urban water (demand management)

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Our suggestion

• Rather than picking winners (prescribing who uses
  water, for what, where and how)
• Or looking for engineering solutions (that
  generally shift the problem, not solve it)
• Clarify /refine property rights for all
  users/uses across the system, and let markets
  identify least-cost solutions (which may include
  infrastructure).

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PC website

• Final report on Rural Water Use and the
  Environment
• is available at
• www.pc.gov.au/study/waterstudy/finalreport/waterst
  udy

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