It follows the recommendation by the MDBA’s Northern Basin Review that the Murray-Darling Basin Plan be adjusted to require a total of 320GL of water to be recovered.  

#MoreThanFlow campaign spokesperson Michael Murray said when former Environment Minister Tony Burke signed the Basin Plan into law in 2012; he included provision for the Authority to undertake the Northern Basin Review.  

“Tony Burke acknowledged at the time that more information and research was required to better understand what the Basin Plan settings should be for the Northern Basin Review.  The announcement by the MDBA is the culmination of this review,” Murray said.

“The #MoreThanFlow campaign position is clear - any recommendation that sets a target beyond the current 278 GL of water recovery would be unacceptable to farmers and communities.

“We have always advocated that complementary measures can deliver better environmental outcomes. 

“While we acknowledge that the MDBA has recommended some of these measures, a recovery target of 320GL will still result in further unacceptable job losses for local communities that are already suffering.”

NSW Farmers Association president Derek Schoen said the recommendation would take too much water from communities that were already struggling.

“Despite the Authority’s socio-economic study over the Northern Basin showing major losses to the local economy and wellbeing of the towns as a result of the 278 GL already recovered, the Murray Darling Basin Authority has announced a proposal to remove another 42 GL out of productive use from the Northern Basin,” Schoen said.

“The limited environmental benefit of the additional 42GL will come at a great cost to the community and it just doesn’t add up. 

“There are many alternative approaches that provide far better environmental outcomes, such as feral species control and cold water pollution mitigation. These are far, far better ways to improve the environmental condition of the Basin. It’s about ‘more than flow.’”

Murray said the MDBA’s own research showed that the communities in the Northern Basin were under extreme stress. 

“Overall community wellbeing is declining and individuals in these communities have some of the lowest levels of personal wellbeing in the nation. 

“With 278 GL of water already recovered from these communities, this recommendation still hits hard on communities that are at a tipping point. 

“We’ll work our way through the details of today’s announcement over the course of the next few days, but we cannot support any recommendation that will inflict more pain on communities, or unilaterally reduce the reliability of entitlements.”

As recently as last week, the MDBA said its recommendations on the Northern-Basin Review would have no implication for the Southern Basin, and Murray said he expect the MDBA to adhere to that when it makes its final recommendation to the government.

Community meetings are being held around the region over the next couple of weeks. To get involved, visit http://www.farmers.org.au/morethanflow.