NATIONAL IRRIGATORS’ COUNCIL
Advocating for the Australian irrigated agriculture industry
We're taking a short break to refuel and get ready for 2026.
The NIC Office will be closed from Monday, 22nd December 2025 until Monday 5th January 2026.
On the 12th December, a national Water Minister's meeting and Murray Darling Basin Water Minister's meeting were held - these are known as MinCo meetings.
The national meeting, discussed the preparation and next steps of a renewed National Water Initiative and progress on water efficiency standards, as well as, risks pertaining to increased demands on water including water for data centres (in our view any new demands for
water should be found from new sources, or through existing markets). The communique is available here.
The MDB meeting, discussed progress on the Basin Plan and concerns regarding SDLAM projects. There was no direction mention of constraints,
however some discussion on a strategic approach to SDLAM projects. The communiqué is available here.
On 9 December 2025, DCCEEW held a webinar about progress on implementing the Basin Plan.
If you missed it, you can now see the recording / transcript on their website.
NIC report reviewed the Federal Government’s purchases and found most have low environmental utility and cannot directly contribute to today’s environmental priorities in the Basin – despite costing taxpayers billions.“These additional water buybacks go beyond what was required to ‘bridge the gap’ to get Sustainable Diversion Limits in place for the Basin Plan,” said NIC CEO Zara Lowien “most of this additional water will not be able to be used as intended and unlikely to contribute to desired environmental outcomes”. [...]
There have been several concerns raised regarding the Federal Government’s decision to purchase additional water from farmers that go beyond
the water recovery required to ‘bridge the gap’ to reduce water usage to Sustainable Diversion Limits (SDLs), in the Murray-Darling Basin
Plan. The concerns relate to the effectiveness or need for additional water acquisition, with questions on how the Government’s actions are
contributing to policy outcomes, meeting value for taxpayers’ money, and consider the growing evidence that signals alternatives approach to
‘just adding water’ are needed to enhance environmental outcomes around the Basin.
This Report by NIC, provides a preliminary assessment of the Federal Government purchases of additional water under “the 450 GL” program of
the Plan. [...]
The amount of water that can be used in the Southern Murray-Darling Basin may need to drop by a further 255 to 355 gigalitres (GL) after
2026, as States remain behind on vital environmental projects, a new report finds
“Water use has drastically declined since the Basin Plan,” said NIC CEO, Zara Lowien “with one in three litres of irrigation water, now out
of production and new Sustainable Diversion Limits (SDLs) set by the Basin Plan in force". [...]
The MDBA published the Murray-Darling Basin Outlook on Thursday 27 November, looking at the future hydroclimate of the Basin.
It considers a plausible range of climate futures to the year 2050 - assuming existing management arrangements, and will be used to inform
evidence for the Basin Plan Review.
A Member Briefing note is available in the Member Area.
The Minister tabled the third independent review into the Water for Environment Special Account (WESA) which funds the 450 GL of additional water for the environment, constraints and the sustaining basin communities program.
A Member Briefing note with links is available in the Member Area.
Farmers in the Basin are calling on the Federal Government to escalate water security for agriculture as a priority, following the findings
of the Basin Outlook, published today which echoed findings from the National Climate Risk Assessment.
“All climate change scenarios will have significant risks on water security for Australian agriculture,” said NIC CEO, Zara Lowien “farmers
are adapting every day to changing climate, but can only adapt so far, water security is critical” [...]
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agriculture industry.