Murray-Darling Basin Authority's sustainable limits study

Browsing round for background material on a post on my personal blog, Floods, Lake Eyre and yachting, reminded me about  the current Murray-Darling Basin Authority Sustainable Diversion Limits study. A dry title, but one whose purpose is defined in this way:

A central element of the Basin Plan is to set environmentally sustainable limits on the amount of water that can be taken from the Basin’s water resources. These are known as sustainable diversion limits (SDLs). SDLs will limit the amount of surface water and groundwater that can be taken from the Basin and will replace the current cap system.

Last year the Authority released an issues paper for comment; 155 submissions were received in response. You can find the issues paper and public submissions here.

I mention this because the outcomes from the process with its strong environmental focus are likely to have significant and differential economic and social effects across the vast basin affecting, among other things, jobs and land and real estate prices. For that reason, those who currently live in the Basin or who might want to move or invest there really need to monitor the process.

I haven't got my own mind around the issues yet. I will try to do so for a later post.   

The nuts and bolts of preparing a local or regional development strategy - a new series

From time to time I get asked about the best way of preparing a local or regional development development strategy.

Most of these strategies, and especially Government funded ones, fail. They generate a report but no action. The reasons Government funded ones especially fail is that the terms of the grant usually focus on the report, whereas effective planning is all about process.

Peter Drucker, the management guru who did so much to define strategic planning, described it as the futurity of current decisions. By this, he meant simply that planning was effective to the degree that it influenced what we did now, taking the future into account.

Over the next few posts I propose to provide a nuts and bolts guide to the whole process, drawing from my previous writing and experience.    

China and Regional Australia 1 - introduction

I have been in China, making it difficult to post. I found the trip very interesting not just because of the exposure to China itself, but also because of the way it generated new ideas relevant to my various interests. Yes, China is very different from Regional Australia, but there are also surprising shared interests as well as things that we can learn.

For that reason, I thought that I might do a short series of posts while things are still fresh in my memory. I will use this post as an entry page, adding posts at the bottom as I write them.

Posts in the China and Regional Australia series

• China and Regional Australia 2 - attracting Chinese tourists 1: what do we have to sell?
• China and Regional Australia 3 - attracting Chinese tourists 2: telling a story
• China and Regional Australia 4 - attracting Chinese tourists 3: providing the right information

The Birds of Bradley Street - Postscript

Back in October 2006 I carried a story - the Birds of Bradley Street - talking about the way in which a remarkable group of women including tree changers had brought about economic renaissance in the previously depressed New England town of Guyra.

I see from the Armidale Express (17 January) that Guyra's growth has continued, with Mayor Robyn Jackson reporting that council had approved $75 million in development applications over the previous two years. Council was determined to maintain this.

" We feel we're on a roll," Mayor Jackson said. "We feel we can take advantage of lots of industrial situations now. There's more industrial land being opened up in Guyra. We're feeling we're on a wave and want to go ahead with that."

One difficulty that smaller towns like Guyra face is that growth can run up against short term constraints, in particular limited housing stocks.

In Gurya's case, stock and station agents in Guyra have reported that property prices are rising dramatically as the district experiences a population boom. They say there is also a critical shortage of good rental accommodation, good units and homes on acres. This will ease in due course as higher returns attract new real estate investment.