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WATER & IRRIGATION
water is used, for what purpose and by whom. Beyond farmer actions to droughts and floods, there is a critical need for effective and sustainable basin-scale water planning. The 2012 Murray-Darling Basin Plan has reduced water diversions for irriga- tion over what they otherwise have been. Neverthe- less, the 2012 Basin Plan has failed to adequately manage the trade-offs between allocating water for a sustainable environment and drinking water for communities versus water for irrigation. The mass fish kills in western New South Wales in 2018-19 during a severe drought, and again in early 2023 when there was no drought, show that the challenge of delivering environmentally sustainable diversions remains unresolved in Australia’s bread- basket, the Murray-Darling Basin. Absent reform in how water is allocated across competing uses and non-uses, climate change will reduce run-off, lower stream flows and lead to further ecological disasters. This is not just only about ecosystem and cultural losses. Without water reallocations that prevent further ecological declines, the social licence of those who have water rights will be com- promised and possibly withdrawn. Australians must move from a ‘hope for the best’ mindset to individually and collectively pre- paring for and adapting to greater heat stress and water stress. What should get done depends on the place and includes both individual responses and collective action. A more sustainable and collective pathway about how water is managed and to basin planning re- quires much more than the standard ‘tick box’ con- sultations and deliberations. It demands on-going dialogues where all stakeholders, and First Peoples, come together to establish a common understand- ing of the drivers and pressures in relation to water availability and access. To be effective, such dia- logues need to be adequately resourced and to provide sufficient time for participants to reflect and, eventually, to implement actions that pro- mote sustainable rivers, viable communities, and climate-smart agriculture (Grafton 2024). Increasing heat and water stress means that the ‘hydro-illogical cycle’, whereby water reform only
happens when there is a big enough crisis and then converges back to business as usual, is not fit for purpose. While there are no easy responses to climate change, timely adaptation, strategic ‘re- silience thinking’ and much better basin and catch- ment planning and implementation, offer ways forward so that Australians, together, can achieve a sustainable future for all, including farmers. R. Quentin Grafton , FASSA, is Professor of Econom- ics, Australian Laureate Fellow, Convenor of the Water Justice Hub, and Director of the Centre for Water Economics, Environment and Policy at the Crawford School of Public Policy at the Australian National University. Cited References Berkeley Earth (2025) Global Temperature Report for 2024. https://berkeleyearth.org/global-temper- ature-report-for-2024/ Gebrechorkos, S.H., Sheffield, J., Vicente-Serrano, S.M. et al. Warming accelerates global drought se- verity. Nature. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-025- 09047-2 Grafton, R.Q. (2024) Retelling Australia’s Water Story. Monash University Publishing, Melbourne. ISBN 9781922979902 Kompas, T., Che, T,N, Grafton, R.Q. (2024) Global im- pacts of heat and water stress on food production and severe food insecurity. Scientific Reports 14: 14398 https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-024-65274-z Seo, K-W, Ryu, D., Jeon, T. et al. (2025) Abrupt sea level rise and Earth’s gradual pole shift reveal permanent hydrological regime changes in the 21st century. Science 387, 1408-1412. https://www.sci- ence.org/doi/10.1126/science.adq6529 Vicente-Serrano, S.M., Domínguez-Castro, F., Beguería, S. et al. (2025) Atmospheric drought indi- ces in future projections. Nature Water 3, 374–387. https://doi.org/10.1038/s44221-025-00416-9 World Meteorological Organization (2025) Global An- nual to Decadal Climate Update 2025. https://wmo. int/publication-series/wmo-global-annual-decadal- climate-update-2025-2029
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