Big water purchase boosts Murray-Darling

Efforts to save the ailing Murray-Darling Basin have been turbocharged with a
massive water purchase.
With the stroke of a pen and $303 million, the federal government has bought the
rights to enough water to fill half of Sydney harbour.
The 240 billion litres of water rights - easily the largest water buy-up in
Australia's history - has been bought from a NSW farming company.
Conservationists were overjoyed but the deal will provoke another war between the
states over who's doing the hard work to save the basin.
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said the water had been bought from the Twynam
Agricultural Group, a farming giant which runs crops, cattle and cotton on
properties around NSW.
"The water purchased today will be used to restore the rivers and wetlands of the
Murray-Darling Basin to health, with the water used exclusively for environmental
flows," Mr Rudd said.
The government has not bought real water, rather it has bought water rights, which
translates into water when there is enough rain.
Most of the 240 billion litres is called "general security" water, which translates
into real water reasonably often.
The rest is rights to flood water.
Arlene Buchan, healthy rivers coordinator with the Australian Conservation
Foundation, said the deal was a big boost to the environment.
"In one hit, it's a substantial amount of water," she told AAP.
"We're really delighted with this."
The purchase would translate into 107 billion litres in an average year and the
price was "good value for money".
Dr Buchan said the purchase threw a spotlight onto how much work NSW was doing to
save the basin, compared with Queensland, Victoria and South Australia.
Every large water purchase had come from NSW so it was time for real progress in
Victoria and along the Murray river, she said.
"Where is Victoria in all this?"
The NSW Irrigators Council said NSW was doing more than its fair share in trying to
save the basin, and called on the federal government to force Victoria to make
progress.
The National Farmers' Federation did not object to the Twynam deal but was concerned
about agricultural production and local communities.
Water expert Mike Young said the "huge" purchase represented tangible progress for
the basin, although more progress was needed in the south.
Federal opposition water spokesman Greg Hunt said it was "phantom" water and people
should not look for massive flows through the basin.
Water buy-outs spark fears of job losses, but Twynam said there would be no
substantial reduction in its workforce.
The company has already scaled back due to the drought, and has restructured to use
less water after some years of low water allocations.
The government has set aside $3.1 billion to buy farmers' water rights in the
Murray-Darling, but has been criticised in the past for spending it too slowly.
One reason for this - Victoria's controversial four per cent cap on water trading -
is expected to hit the headlines again soon.
It is understood progress is being made on a way to buy more water from Victoria.