NATIONAL IRRIGATORS’ COUNCIL

MEDIA RELEASES

Advocating for the Australian irrigated agriculture industry

The Australian Government committed $3.5 million over 2 years in the 2025–26 Budget to develop the Feeding Australia: National Food Security Strategy. This was part of an election commitment from the Federal Government, backed by NIC and NFF. 

The Government has now published a discussion paper for feedback, with submissions closing on 24 September 2025.

NIC will be providing a submission, and we encourage our memebrs to do the same. We will share our draft submission with you shortly. 

The IGWC has published the Sustainable Diversion Limit Compliance Report for 2023-24, while the MDBA has published their Registers of Take.

The IGWC report found "All 78 SDL resource units assessed for the 2023–2024 water accounting year were found to be compliant. Those water resource areas without an accredited WRP (for the full water year), were also seperately assessed as compliant. Our analysis shows water usage is actually 12% below the SDL.

IGWC Report: https://www.igwc.gov.au/sites/default/files/documents/2025-08/sustainable-diversion-limit-compliance-report-2023-2024.pdf
MDBA Registers of Take: 2023-24 Sustainable Diversion Limit Accounts

We have just put in our submission for the third Water for Environment Special Account (WESA) review - take a look.

Our key recommendation: "The Independent Panel take a broad view to examine the policy settings and decision-making on the use of WESA funds to achieve enhanced environmental outcomes with consideration of socio-economic impact - to ensure WESA can be used transparently to target priority environmental investments. We encourage you to explore the option to amend the WESA to ensure it can be used transparently to target priority environmental investments such as community-supported constraints measures and investment in non-flow complementary measures as evidence within the 2025 Basin Plan Evaluation and Sustainable Rivers Audit."

Thank you to our members who have contributed to this piece of work, and taking the time to provide feedback. 

OneBasin CRC and the Australian Water School hosted on webinar on "the impact of climate change on crop irrigation requirements across the Murray-Darling Basin".

We haven't had a chance to watch it yet, but you can view the recording online. 

Here's the outline:

Irrigated farming in the Murray–Darling Basin faces increasing challenges due to a warmer and drier climate. With water supply decreasing and irrigation demand rising, farmers need better insights into future water needs to sustain their crops and investments. Understanding these changes is crucial for medium to long-term planning and for making informed decisions about crop choices and water sourcing.

Join a panel of experts who are modelling the future irrigation needs of key crops in the Murray–Darling Basin under various climate change scenarios via a One Basin CRC funded-project.

Join our panellists as they explore:
- Using existing climate, soil, and crop data to calculate potential changes in irrigation demand;
- How crop water requirements might change over the mid to long-term; and
- Initiatives to help farmers and irrigation suppliers plan for a future with higher temperatures and less water.

The 2025 Ricardo Water Markets Report was published this week. The report has really useful data on water markets, including on Cth water buybacks. Worth a look!

Some quick facts:

  • Estimated value of commercial allocation trade in major southern MDB trading zones: $235 million
  • Annual average southern MDB allocation prices: $115 per ML in NSW Murray (above Barmah) to $177 per ML in NSW Murrumbidgee
  • Estimated value of major southern MDB entitlement on issue (including environmental and Victorian water corporation holdings): $31.9 billion.
An interesting statement: "While the 605 GL SDLAM recovery is legislated under the Basin Plan, the recovery of the 450 GL additional environmental water is an in-principal agreement between Basin states and the Commonwealth. In its first term, the Albanese Government had pledged to recover the full 450 GL; however, there is no legislated requirement for this."

If there's one video those working in water must watch this year, it's this - Professor Forest Reinhardt from Harvard Business School talking to Andrew McConville at this years River Reflections Conference on water property rights (watch from 45 minutes into Day 1). 

Let us know your favourite quotes!

One of our favourites (1hr 18mins in) - in response to a question on what a future Basin Plan should look like: "If the subsequent versions of the Basin Plan, can make water more and more like a normal commodity... just as if you own a piece of land... I think that the more you can make water rights look like normal property rights, the more effective the system will be. I come from a country where we can't even get to the starting line of that kind of thing."


The NIC team produced a quick overview of the MDBA's 2025 Basin Plan Evaluation and Sustainable Rivers Audit, saying  (published 24 July, here) the key findings were:

  • Environmental Targets met and overall positive environmental outcomes from the Basin Plan, despite some poor findings (native fish);
  • Strong points for the need for complementary measures;
  • Problematic socio-economic impact assessment, with changes not attributed to water reforms (e.g., external factors), or downplaying the significance of the impact due to the method.
  • There are 32 documents published, some many hundreds of pages long – we continue to review in detail.

Today’s publication of the Murray Darling Basin Authority’s (MDBA) 2025 Basin Plan Evaluation and Sustainable Rivers Audit has found the health of the Basin has improved, advising that “water for the environment is essential, but on its own is likely not sufficient” [MDBA Overview]...  The National Irrigators’ Council has described many parts of the Evaluation as refreshing and a wakeup call needed to shape thinking in the Basin going forward and is calling for more quick thinking on how to determine and prioritise a package of strategic environmental investments in these complementary (non-flow) measures to inform next steps on the Basin Plan, given the Evaluation found this as a missing piece of the current Plan puzzle.  [...]

Show More

Join Our Community

Find out more about our community, and join our mission advocating for the Australian irrigated agriculture industry.

Our Community
 Our Community


Website Disclaimer |  Privacy Policy |  Terms & Conditions