Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
How these potential risks will affect the water in the basin is still largely unknown. In
some cases, for example, climate change and bushfires, the capacity to directly reduce the
impacts on the basin's surface waters is limited, but building the capacity to adapt is
critical. In other cases, the Governments may have the opportunity to identify and
implement management strategies to reduce the impacts. The development of policy
options based on sound science and complemented by economic and social analysis will
help to address these risks to our shared water resources.
Future
The MDBC has recently developed a five-year strategic plan to provide principles to
guide the work of the commission, with a vision of working towards a sustainable natural
resource with healthy ecosystems, which will support prosperous communities. The three
objectives of the new MDBC strategic plan are:
protection and enhancement of the basin's shared environmental assets and water
resources
efficient and equitable delivery of water for productive and sustainable domestic
consumption, environmental benefit and economic use, and
delivery of high quality advice to Council, and achievement of its endorsed priorities,
through strengthened capacity of the commission and the commission office.
For the first time, we are developing an Integrated Basin Report, which will bring
together and report on aspects of basin condition to guide future investment.
Key strengths of commission and Council structure
Different aspects of the Commission's activities affect jurisdictions differently and
while the Commission and Council structure can result in slow decision making and
tension between the ministerial council and individual ministers in taking responsibility
for progressive decisions, jurisdictions have persisted with the arrangement for about a
century.
Representation from each jurisdiction of water, land and environment ministers
means that MDBC decisions are taken in the context of prevailing jurisdictional
conditions. The requirement for unanimity in decisions is essential to the functioning of
the structure. A network of inter-governmental and technical committees provides advice
to the Commission and is essential to its smooth functioning.
The representative nature of the Commission is both a strength and a weakness as it
ensures that state interests are considered but there is no requirement that that
jurisdiction's primary focus necessarily coincides with the best interests of the basin.
A further strength of the structure is the independent audit approach to evaluate
progress on critical issues. Bringing together the audited results of strategies in an
integrated basin report should support the notion of basin-wide assessment.
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