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ABC interviews Prof. Gary Jones

Wednesday 14 April 2010

ABC Rural Reporter, Mary Goode, talks to Professor Gary Jones about his views on the Productivity Commission's report on saving water in the Murray-Darling Basin.

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Despite the Productivity Commission’s report on saving water in the Murray-Darling Basin recommending water buybacks be given priority over infrastructure spending, Federal Water Minister Penny Wong has ruled out spending reductions on infrastructure upgrades.

ABC Rural Reporter, Mary Goode, interviewed Professor Gary Jones, CEO of eWater CRC, on the Productivity Commission’s report and his views on the state of the Murray-Darling Basin.

eWater CRC CEO Professor Dr Gary Jones has endorsed a decision by Federal Water Minister Penny Wong to rule out reduced spending on infrastructure upgrades in the Murray-Darling Basin, despite a recommendation of the Productivity Commission.
 
The Commission’s report on water savings recommends water buybacks be given priority over infrastructure spending.
 
ABC Rural Reporter, Mary Goode interviewed Professor Jones on the Productivity Commission’s report and his views on the state of the Murray-Darling Basin in April.
 
Prof. Jones noted the Productivity Commission’s report highlighted legislative specifics of the Water Act requiring that the environment come first, and incorporate economic and social factors. However he pointed out that while the report claimed very little money was being spent on infrastructure, it also declared spending to very inefficient.
 
“I not quite certain where the truth lies,” he said.
 
Many of the projects conducted to date had inarguably been very expensive on a per mega litre recovered basis, Prof. Jones said, but they also provided more benefits than just the water recovered.
 
“I think the Productivity Commission is forgetting that there has been an enormous amount of work done on this in the last 10 or 15 years, particularly in the Murray-Darling Basin. For example, I co-authored a report back in 2003, which recommended to the Government that at least 1500 gigalitres had to be recovered for the southern Murray system alone,” he said. “So right now the total recovery of water in the Murray-Darling Basin is only about 800 GL. And the three billion the Government has put to this probably can’t buy much more than 1500 GL of high security water anyway. So I’m less concerned about that.”
 
He went on to say that “…there is some valuable comment in the Productivity Commission report, but I think that in the end this is a pretty dry economic assessment of what is a far more complex problem.
 
Professor Gary Jones is a distinguished water scientist, with extensive experience in environment and water management. He is the CEO of eWater CRC, eWater Ltd., and also a director of eWater Innovation and the Peter Cullen Water and Environment Trust.

Professor Gary Jones

Professor Gary Jones, CEO eWater

 

 

Click on the image below to read the ABC article.