Drought threatens food and wine production in Tasmania's south-east
As the climate changes, producers in the Coal River Valley in Tasmania are having to adapt, with drought holding them back. (ABC News: Maren Preuss)
The future of some farms in Tasmania's south-east are shaky after a federal government decision to knock back funding for new water for crops and livestock.
A new multi-million dollar irrigation scheme would have bypassed Hobart's drinking water system and provided new cheaper water, but it all hinged on 150 million dollars from the federal government to be announced in the budget.
The federal government's funds would be 50 per cent of the project costs with the state and irrigators funding 25 per cent each.
The $301 million dollar scheme would tap into Lake Meadowbank in the Derwent Valley and merge three existing irrigation schemes, bypassing infrastructure used for drinking water.
It was expected to be a sure thing — until it wasn't.
Viability of businesses under threat, producers say
Sophie Milic, from the Coal River Products Association, said it would have a big impact on local businesses.
"It will absolutely threaten the viability of many businesses, if we can't get good irrigation water that we can rely on, and that we can essentially predict the price of and be able to build that into our business model," she said.
Dairy, strawberries, cherries, lamb, walnuts, apricots, and wine operations have had to work with water restrictions in the past, as well as unpredictable pricing.
"We're relying on a stopgap solution at the moment, which is using TasWater, so essentially, drinking water, which is not ideal, and the cost of that is set to keep increasing.
"We can't run businesses paying that amount of money for irrigation water."
Cherry grower Nic Hansen has more than 80 hectares of cherry trees on his property on Hobart's eastern shore.
He says the results of climate change daily, and that he was planning to buy new water entitlements.
"The rainfall is just so low, there's no runoff, the ground is bone dry, and we're relying 100 per cent on irrigation," he added.
"Last year here at Old Beach we only had 146 millimetres (of rain) from the first of January to the 28th of September.
"This year, we're tracking exactly the same, exactly the same," Mr Hansen said.
"I mean, that's nuts.
"It's very frustrating for us as orchardists and farmers that the politicians continually espouse growth in Australian agriculture, and yet in the same breath knock this back."
Also reeling are farmers in the dry Jordan Valley — home to dairy, sheep, and vineyard operations.
Dairy farmer, Ben Geard appeared visibly shocked by the budget knockback.
He'd been hoping to shore up water for his herd of Green Glory Holsteins.
"It's definitely taken the wind out of our sails… and it's not something we need at the moment, things are tough enough as it is, we didn't need that bad news, that's for sure," he said.
His property relies on water from the Jordan River but in summer it rarely runs and runoff has been minimal in the past six months.
"Maybe we didn't make enough noise, maybe we were too comfortable in the fact that Tasmanian Irrigation hadn't been knocked back before," he said.
Changing climate to hit eastern, southern Tasmania hard
Scientists have confirmed what these farmers already know, Tasmania's south-east has been particularly dry.
"We're getting less rainfall, and we're getting more water loss, so farmers are essentially hit with the double whammy," said Associate Professor Matthew Harrison from Tasmania's Institute of Agriculture.
And the science is predicting it will keep getting dryer.
"You could say that the impacts of climate change are everywhere, but eastern and southern Tasmania in particular will be regions of the state most impacted by the changing climate over the next few decades," he said.
"The rainfall signal is difficult to predict, but generally speaking, forecasts project less rainfall in spring and autumn, and greater frequencies of extreme events, particularly drought."
He supports more irrigation projects.
"We've got lots of water, we just need to trap it," associate professor Harrison said.
"Once that water is there, we can use it in whatever way we like for high value, premium cropping products, and that I think would be our niche,'."
Tasmanian Irrigation will resubmit its business case but it's not sure when.
Producers doing what they can to get through conditions
Time waits for no-one.
Farmers in the Coal Valley are expecting price rises from TasWater.
New vigneron Karen Stewart will batten down the hatches, she believes others will as well.
"In 2019, we planted 11 hectares of vines, and we only did that because we could access the irrigation scheme," she said.
"We've got plans for another 14, 15 or so hectares, we've got that marked out on the plan, but we wouldn't go ahead with that unless we had the surety of cheap water.
"They're not going to invest because they'll be too scared that the prices will get beyond their reach."
TasWater says it will announce its water prices to Tasmanian Irrigation soon.
"The current discussions are about moving towards a price that is fair for all TasWater customers.
"Long-term our strategy is for Tasmanian Irrigation to lessen and ultimately cease the need to rely on our treated drinking water," customer and community general manager Matt Balfe said.
The Government Business Enterprise did not rule out further water restrictions in the future.
A spokesperson for the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water said the government had "deferred" making a decision on the Tasmanian government's request for a $150.6 million contribution through the National Water Grid Fund "at this time".
They said the federal Minister for Environment and Water Tanya Plibersek had "met with Tasmanian Irrigation this week" and that the federal government was "continuing to work with the Tasmanian government to further understand the project".
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