The Murray-Darling Basin in Australia

Alistair Watson aswatson@bigpond.net.au

Tim Cummins Tim.Cummins@bigpond.com

October 2010 1A 100-year experiment

History may be bunk, but it determines the starting point for analysis:

it modified the river in particular ways; it set the patterns of usage; and it framed expectations.

Our environmental objectives change in time spans shorter than those of human life.

An understanding of the common threads in economic and environmental analysis will help to improve water policy.

October 2010 2A 100-year experiment

Common threads in economic and environmental analysis

Four phases of development in water policy

The experiment continues

Concluding comments October 2010A 100-year experiment 3

‘The economy’ and ‘the environment’ are both abstractions and aggregate abstractions at that.

We are in the realm of the rhetorical and the metaphysical as we grapple with the micro and the macro.

The currency of analysis is by default indexes, surrogates and proxies.

October 2010A 100-year experiment 4

By their nature, policy questions around economics and the environment are empirical; decisions must depend on the facts and the circumstances.

Confusion over the starting point (sunk costs) and the idea of equilibrium, plagues water policy.

October 2010A 100-year experiment 5

upstream versus downstream

fish versus birds versus redgums versus the Coorong

October 2010A 100-year experiment 6

Exploration

Expansion

Maturation

Contraction

October 2010A 100-year experiment 7

Poetic insights misconstrued

Private failures and public enthusiasms

Romanticism and recklessness (even then)

Improving nature

October 2010A 100-year experiment 8

Subduing the bush

“I can feel a dam coming on.”

A yeoman class

Subsidised inputs and subsidised outputs

October 2010A 100-year experiment 9

Iranian conventions

Wet or dry?

Chowilla howler

October 2010A 100-year experiment 10

Government’s strategic retreat

Trade then cap

Baby steps and the First Step

October 2010A 100-year experiment 11

Institutions, institutions, institutions.

the public versus private Commonwealth versus state issues imbalance of funding and expertise the local versus regional versus national integration of disparate disciplinary

knowledge

October 2010A 100-year experiment 12

The return of scarcity

The return of government

Returned flows

October 2010A 100-year experiment 13

Big-bang theory

Whimper theory

String theory

October 2010A 100-year experiment 14

Big-bang theory Crash through or crash?

Whimper theory And now for the tincture of tenderness.

String theory As long as it takes – or messy gradualism.

October 2010A 100-year experiment 15

Collaboration All should be playing to their institutional strengths.

A harness for social capital If only we could use that force for good instead of evil.

The unification of quantum theory and relativity?

How much do we need? How much must we let go? Which things do we care most about?

October 2010A 100-year experiment 16

That is the question.

The rub is, that we will never get it right.

Nonetheless, we can and should continue to get better.

October 2010A 100-year experiment 17

Irrigation infrastructure spending should be put on hold.

Environmental infrastructure spending (works and measures) should proceed.

Water buyback should proceed more slowly while tangible environmental projects are sorted out.

Now that it has rained, the flow-related issues per se are less urgent.

Messy gradualism is not so bad.October 2010A 100-year experiment 18