Question Details	Asked By	Asked On
Should feral crops join feral animals on the hit list?	paraclete	12/17/03
The focus should be on changing over to farming more suited to the environment, writes Derek Eamus. Frank Sartor tells us to use a broom to clear the driveway and a bucket, not a hose, to clean the car. Worthy suggestions to start weaning urban Australians from our wasteful disregard of the value of water. But is this really the best way to tackle the water crisis that is with us now and will be with us for the next decade or four? The Australian Bureau of Statistics tell us that of all the water used in Australia, 70 per cent is used in the agriculture industry, 14 per cent is used in other industries and only 8 per cent is used by the domestic market. I guess if I was looking to have a significant impact on water consumption by Australians I would naturally start with the sector that uses the least - not. But there is value to be had from educating the urban population about resource economics and it a foretaste of what the future holds for us - and the future, with regard to water in Australia, is bleak. Of course, with the agriculture sector using 70 per cent of the water consumed in Australia, we could be forgiven for thinking that this represents the most cost-effective allocation of a scarce resource - water. And we all know that sheep, cattle and wheat form the mainstay of a great rural economy that feeds Australia and supports the export industry. Unfortunately the figures might not support this rosy ideal. The iconic picture of the rural Aussie battler underpinning the Australian economy is merely a 19th-century rear-view mirror image. The gross domestic product of Australia was $670,030 million for 2000-01. Of this, services accounted for 72 per cent, industry (including mining) accounted for 26 per cent and agriculture accounted for only 3 per cent. So 70 per cent of our water use supports a sector that contributes about 3 per cent to Australia's GDP. Meanwhile, we impose water use restrictions on the largest single group of people in Australia (the urban population) that uses the smallest percentage of water. Am I missing something here? Could it be politics? Let us look at the return on the investment of this resource. A recent hefty CSIRO report shows that to generate $1 of output from the rice industry, more than 7000 litres of water are required. Rice is not alone, though. It is just the worst. For the sugar cane industry, more than 1200 litres of water are needed and for seed cotton, 1600 litres of water are needed for every single dollar produced. Surely we must ask - is this the most appropriate use of water in Australia - land of drought, El Nino, scorching sun and hot dry winds? If we bottled the groundwater upon which we rely so much and sold it for a profit of 1 cent a litre, we might make more money than the rice industry. There are well understood reasons for introduced crops to need so much water, compared with native plants of Australia. Strong evolutionary and biological reasons can explain the frugal water needs of our native species and the water guzzling of introduced crops. What is harder to explain is why we persist in growing such crops in such silly places (Australia) and why our political masters insist on imposing water restrictions on the sector that actually uses the least water. But then again, when has politics had anything to do with science or common sense? In 17th- and 18th-century Europe, large numbers of workers were employed in rushcutting, barrel-making and the manufacture of clay pipes. In the 19th century, farriers were common. Today, these industries hardly exist and we accept that some industries become obsolete or evolve or are replaced. In the 19th and 20th centuries, Australia was dependent on sheep, beef and agricultural industries for employment and export. In the 21st century, perhaps growing broadacre crops in Australia will be viewed as something that is not sustainable. Perhaps niche marketing of new crops (native flowers? olives?) will take over from our Eurocentric predilection for broadacre cropping of water-hungry species. I hope so. Professor Derek Eamus is director of the Institute for Water and Environmental Resource Management, University of Technology.
Answered By		Answered On
wvseagull		01/08/04
Having just eaten a succulent leg of lamb that came from Australia, I hope that you do not stop producing sheep there. The water deal is not unique to Australia. There are strange ones all over. One of the strangest to me has always been that the French have sent us water in bottles for years. Just how stupid can we be? Here in the US, Los Angeles, San Diego, Denver, Phoenix are all large metropolitan areas built in arid country or deserts. Some years ago a congressman named Mike something or other, was proposing a big ditch to send water from the Mississippi River west toward Denver, to irrigate land. The ditch would have taken more land out of production than would have irrigated. Some plumber he would have made! Why in the hell are people trying to raise rice and sugar cane in the middle of deserts? If they really want to, let them truck the water in from a river's mouth where it meets the sea. There are nuts EVERYWHERE, not just on the road, Mate. LOL Regards, Dan

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