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UN RCE Murray-Darling

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25.01.2022 The Murray-Darling Basin Authority has been accused of maladministration, deliberately ignoring the best science on the river, leaning on the CSIRO to alter rep...orts on the adequacy of the basin plan and ignoring the impact of climate change in its future planning. In a scathing assessment of the authority, counsel assisting the South Australian Murray-Darling royal commission, Richard Beasley SC, has painted a picture of an organisation cowed by its political masters and too afraid to present its own scientific data to the greater scientific community. Row erupts over ‘undermining’ of Murray-Darling plan Read more The implementation of the basin plan has been marred by maladministration and mismanagement, Beasley said. Responsibility for that falls on current executives and the board. Beasley has highlighted serious allegations about the adequacy of the MDBA’s modelling which came up with the figure of 2,750 gigalitres of water to be recovered for the environment under the plan. Numerous scientists regarded the number as too low. This recovery target is central to the plan and is now being cut further as a result of amendments which aim to achieve the same environmental outcomes without having to buy water from farmers. Most scientists no, every scientist who gave evidence described the setting of the sustainable diversion limit [SDL, the amount to be recovered] and the environmentally sustainable level of take [ESLT, the amount that could be safely extracted from the river system] as ‘not science’.

22.01.2022 An excellent article by my friend Adam Willson We know a lot about what needs to stop, and what needs to be done to heal landscapes... even the Prime Minister is now aware of the effectiveness of regenerative agriculture after his visits to the Mulloon Institute during a recent tour of NSW drought regions. Now we need to find better ways to identify and coordinate the players with the requisite capabilities and maturity to assist each other in Mutually Assistive Communities, ...communities that help each other, build resilience, build critical mass, and scale out in ways tailored for bioregional regeneration. We don't need everyone on board initially; however, as responsible and variously response-able agents in these linked social-ecological systems, we must enable this systemic shift if our systems are to thrive, especially in the face of compounding systemic shocks heading our way. Yes - this drought is bad... and it's likely to get a whole lot worse. The pioneers in this next wave are more likely to be those not already fully captured by vested interests and old paradigms that pander to outdated models that do more long term harm than good. They will be awake, aware farmers, academics, governments and organisations keen on surviving in the places they live, not fly-by-night operators, extracting a quick buck and leaving a toxic legacy when we know better ways are possible.

16.01.2022 An excellent review of some of the issues I (peripherally) encountered in my engagements in the Murray-Darling Basin - worth a read for those interested in what's been going on and what's been going wrong. https://www.michaelwest.com.au/from-visionary-to-venal-wh/ In Recommendation 1 of the Accelerated Engagement Report -- RCE-MD Governance approach to positively influence the future -- I said:... "Opportunity As far as can be discerned without further inquiry, nobody in the Murray-Darlingno organisation, institution or level of governmentis allowed to properly consider, let alone adequately tackle, the wicked problems and compounding systemic issues in the Murray-Darling Basin from a community-centric, whole system anticipatory design perspective. Many are trying, but will not succeed while constrained within the same governance systems and assumptions that continue to try to maintain stability (sustain the unsustainable) when increasing evidence shows this will not be possible. There is an opportunity for an organisation to demonstrate systems leadership, leading by systems ethical example and assisting willing others develop the capability and maturity for adaptive leadership and to find their own ways forward, with diversity and unity. Issue A big-picture helicopter perspective reveals that communities globally are vulnerable to impending and compounding systemic crises and natural system disruptions being caused by mankind’s choices, projects, actions, economies and the philosophies and worldviews that drive them. In the last 12 months major religions and interfaith movements have reached similar conclusions. The grass-roots element of the Accelerated Engagement Initiative revealed some of the diverse participants are aware yet most are not encouraged or empowered to change themselves or assist change in their communities. Most efforts, despite good intentions, are piecemeal and small-scale. Consequently all communities are vulnerable to coming shocks; some more than others. Education for Sustainability will fail these communities unless it builds the requisite skills for understanding, enabling and coping with the transformations necessary for anticipatory design, adaptive governance and integrative development at multiple scales in community’s best interests. Assisting development of sustainable, resilient, culturally diverse, prosperous communities requires capacity to BOTH operate at multiple levelsfrom helicopter (whole system design) perspectives to on-the-ground grass-roots engagement and implementation (supporting/ doing stuff locally)AND foster the development pathways across and between these perspectives and levels of endeavour." ______________ Neil Davidson: Draft Accelerated Engagement Report - Recommendation 1 - September 2015

09.01.2022 I found this a good article. I have contacted the author to see whether she is still in Australia, and interested in my failed(?)/ dormant(?) attempt to apply several of the key aspects in my work in the Murray-Darling Basin in Australia. As those here know, I was trying to accelerate a UN Regional Centre of Expertise for Ed for Sustainability. One of my recommendations (2015) had this title: "Fostering collective systems knowledge through creating nurturing spacesfor knowle...Continue reading

08.01.2022 Peter Andrew's and Mulloon Institute's Natural Sequence Farming and Landscape Rehydration getting some well-earned recognition in times of desparate drought. Le...t's hope that the ray of hope generated by political interest at the highest levels isn't lost in unbacked rhetoric and the annals of obscurity as this Government, too, most likely, succumbs to the drought of truly transformative political leadership in Oz... Imagine if we were actually gearing our entire rural sector revival around educating, training, assisting, encouraging and refining these techniques, Australia-wide and globally.... Blue Ring is active in this space, internationally, yet the institutional inertia in Oz is, as implied in the article, a regular barrier to 'innovation' beyond regulated current practices.

07.01.2022 There has been much talk of late about the plight of the Darling River, with blue-green algal blooms, fish kills and drying and dying ecologies and communities as a result of a range of factors impacting water flow. Let's face it, it is not as simple as some (many) make out. The underlying causes are poor quality and quantity of water and changes in temperature influencing natural processes of life and death....Continue reading