Evaluation of the economic feasibility of water harvesting for irrigation in a large semi-arid tropical catchment in northern Australia

Petheram, Cuan; McKellar, Lisa; Holz, Linda; Poulton, Perry; Podger, Scott; Yeates, S. J.

doi:10.1016/j.agsy.2015.11.007

Cited by 5 publications

(1 citation statement)

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“…There may be more opportunities to convert rangeland to more intensive crop production and the opportunities for that type of agricultural development have been examined at various intervals over the last 70 years (e.g. Chapman et al 1996;Petheram et al 2016), but such development at scale remains elusive.…”

Section: Context For Agricultural Development In Northern Australiamentioning

confidence: 99%

Developing the north: learning from the past to guide future plans and policies

Ash

Watson

2018

Rangel. J.

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The development of northern Australia has been a policy ambition for over a century and the desire to do so continues unabated. Attempts to develop the north, especially for more intensive forms of agriculture are not new. In this paper we explore past agricultural developments, including some that persist today and those that have failed, to determine critical factors in success or failure. This was done with the aim of identifying where most effort should focus in supporting contemporary agricultural developments. Although climatic and environmental constraints, including pests and diseases, remain a challenge for agricultural development in these largely tropical rangelands, it is mainly factors associated with finances and investment planning, land tenure and property rights, management, skills, and supply chains, which provide the critical challenges. In particular, the desire to scale-up too rapidly and the associated failure to invest sufficient time and resources in management to learn how to develop appropriate farming systems that are sustainable and economically viable is a recurrent theme through the case study assessment. Scaling up in a more measured way, with a staged approach to the investment in physical capital, should better allow for the inevitable set-backs and the unexpected costs in developing tropical rangelands for agriculture. There are two notable differences from the historical mandate to develop. First is the acknowledgement that development should not disadvantage Indigenous people, that Indigenous people have strong interests and rights in land and water resources and that these resources will be deployed to further Indigenous economic development. Second, assessing environmental impacts of more intensive development is more rigorous than in the past and the resources and timeframes required for these processes are often underestimated.

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Section: Context For Agricultural Development In Northern Australiamentioning

confidence: 99%