Murray-Darling Farming Towns Crumbling - Rice Output Down 93%, Orchards Dying - SMH

[hatrack]

HUNDREDS of thousands of fruit trees have been pulled out, rice production has plunged by 93 per cent and vineyards lie abandoned as the "irrigation drought" continues unabated in Australia's southern food bowl. Farmers and the regional towns that rely on them in the giant Murray-Darling Basin are suffering from a cruel, unprecedented combination of low rainfall and severe cuts in water allocations as the reservoirs dry up, leading to a population exodus in the worst-hit areas, including the southern Riverina.

"It's the first time there has been a real scarcity of irrigation water," said Peter Gooday, productivity and water manager for the agricultural research body, ABARE. The amount of water allocated to farmers has dropped by 20 to 30 per cent. "The run of low inflow years is a low probability event and something we haven't seen before," he said.

This short-term drop had been far more calamitous than the CSIRO's climate change scenario that there would be 11 per cent less water available in 2030, he said. This state's Murray River country has officially been in drought for more than 1200 days and, west of Albury, rolling dust storms regularly hit empty paddocks and dry irrigation canals.

As Sydney was bathed in rain yesterday, blue skies prevailed in the southern Riverina. The irrigation drought was "uncharted territory," the Productivity Commission's deputy chairman, Mike Woods, said when the commission released its draft inquiry report late last year. The federal Agriculture Minister, Tony Burke, received the final report on Friday and will table it within three weeks.

EDIT

http://www.sundayherald.com/international/shinternational/display.var.2494109.0.0.php

[phantom power]

1. "low probability event"

Probabilities may be different in the new world, Peter.