Back on the drought

I’d like to say that we, as a rural church, have been very encouraged by the breadth of the supportive contacts we have received from our urban counterparts.

Meanwhile, an update. The brief scattered showers here and there are making no particular difference but nevertheless are received with gratitude. There has been massive sale of stock – cattle and sheep, including dairy herds – because it is difficult to feed them. Prices generally are very poor. Crops are very poor and thin and most farmers have turned the sheep onto the crops – they get more value out of them that way rather than running a big harversting machine over the pitiful crop. Here on the Murray river, the Victorian side is getting a reasonable amount of irrigation (about half what they would like) with reasonably sure supply. Under a different system, the NSW side continues to get their promised water reduced. Officially our NSW farmers get zero irrigation this year, but they have been able to buy it from other farmers who had some “carry-over” water from last year. Hideously expensive, this water has now been savagely cut – 20% cut a month ago, an additional 32% cut last Friday. So, a farmer in my church who spent $50,000 buying water does not get any of his money back but now only gets 48% of the water he has bought. The rest of the water he will be given in a better year when there is more available – small consolation. Our citrus growers have what is called ‘high security water’ and have never before had any cut-back on their full entitlement. This year they, too are only getting 50%. They are trying to think how they might ‘mothball’ the trees to keep them alive even if they lose the fruit. Otherwise their livelihood will be lost for years to come. Grape-growers and orchardists in other areas are facing the same issue. We had a discussion about the situation in our church on Sunday and some great pain and heaviness was evident on quite a few farmers’ faces.

Meanwhile, 14 gigalitres was allocated to fill up the dry Hattah Lake system for an environmental flow. About 10 gigs have been pumped in there so far (that is an enormous amount of water), but the DSE wisely decided to turn the pumps off this week – farmers had threatened to blow them up. A water expert in our town has calculated the amount of water in storage (there is no water flowing into the Murray or the Snowy from natural flows)

and divided it by the average weekly consumption out of it, and concluded that in 23 weeks the Murray will run dry. In 1915, it was dry from Albury on. Our church has a valued photograph of a Sunday School picnic with carriages and crinolines in the dry bed of the river near Barham. It is quite natural. Unfortunately, several hundred thousand people have since built houses and communities along the river on the strength of the idea that its flow is guaranteed by upstream storages. We appreciate people’s prayers and support as we seek to be a useful force in the rural community. It is hard to know how to be much help. Thanks everyone,

Geoff Leslie