Dam Facts
The Four Corners investigation into the Murray-Darling scheme typically targeted big business while ignoring the benefits to the river and small operators, says James Mathias.
The ABC seldom misses an opportunity to inform its viewers of the corporate greed and vested interests ruining Australia. This week it was big business ripping off the taxpayer and sucking water from the Murray River at the same time, as Four Corners would have you believe.
The Murray-Darling Basin Water Infrastructure Program pays farmers and land holders along the river to invest in projects that make their operations more water efficient and to support them to build their own catchments to reduce reliance on the river. This could be anything from building a dam to fixing leaking pipes.
In return for this, a farmer will transfer an agreed amount of their saved water rights back to the Government.
Four Corners employed its usual editing style, of which viewers are surely by now becoming tired: an introduction by the reporter earnestly outlining this week's alleged outrage; innocuous footage of ordinary scenes (in this case paddocks and rivers shot from a drone) made dramatic by a corny, sinister soundtrack; and loosely related interviews juxtaposed to form a misleading narrative.
It also ignored a few key facts. The water-efficiency program has funded 1,500 projects, 95 per cent of which were less than $1 million. In fact, the average amount of each project was just $152,000, for small farmers and small projects.
The Hume Dam on the Murray River at Albury-Wodonga.
Four Corners also neglected to say how much water the program has returned to the basin. You’d be forgiven if you thought the program had actually drained water out of the basin. But since its inception, the program has returned 700 gigalitres (or 200gl more than all the water in Sydney Harbour) to the river system. This water is not available for irrigators to then purchase again.
The farmers who had responded to market forces were also singled out. Almond and cotton growers were criticised for choosing thirsty crops, compromising water supply in the greedy pursuit of bigger profits. But the water intensity of your crop does not increase your water entitlement. The total market for water is capped, so no individual user can influence the overall consumption.
The water efficiency program was developed after Labor’s widely criticised water buyback scheme that reduced farm production, and had a flow-on effect for unemployment in rural towns. The efficiency program invests in the farm to make it as efficient as possible. It protects livelihoods while reducing the waste of water.
Four Corners was clearly biased against farmers and business. If it had been balanced, there would not have been a story. Neither Water Resources Minister David Littleproud nor his office were contacted for comment, let alone an interview.
The “investigation” was called Cash Splash. This, from our $1 billion taxpayer-funded ABC. Go figure.