by Chris McCormack
News Weekly, December 15, 2018
The current approach to managing the water resources of the Murray-Darling Basin (MDB) seems to be a classic case of “straining out gnats while swallowing camels”.
The Federal Government plans to return an additional 450 gigalitres of water “to the environment” as part of the Murray-Darling Basin Plan (MDBP) via $1.4 billion of taxpayers’ money to buy farmers’ water allocations and increase water efficiency. Already, 2100 GL of water has been diverted away from agricultural production to “environmental flows” as part of the MDBP.
A further 605 GL is being directed to the environment via water “savings measures”. Up to 70 per cent of water in reservoirs feeding the MDB is earmarked for “the environment”. One of the problems with diverting such large amounts of water away from food production and sending it down river is that there is no scientific basis to claims that the extra water is benefitting the environment. Quite the reverse, in fact.
Read the full article: http://newsweekly.com.au/article.php?id=58362
Is the “environmental water” being traded? Who owns this environmental water?
Ask our politicians to provide official statements regarding “Who owns our national parks? Who owns our environmental water? Who owns the Great Barrier Reef?”
I recall Ticky Fullerton discussing the issuing of Bonds against the Great Barrier Reef during an interview on her TV program a few years ago. Is it or will it be mortgaged?