Benefits of Increased Irrigation Efficiency in the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area
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ABARE CONFERENCE PAPER 2001.10 Benefits of increased irrigation efficiency in the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area Adrian Kemp and Ahmed Hafi Australian Bureau of Agricultural and Resource Economics 45th Annual Conference of the Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, Adelaide, 22–25 January 2001 Limited water availability in the face of increasing competing demands for water, including water for environmental purposes, has highlighted the need to make the most efficient use of the available water in the Murray Darling Basin. This study focuses on the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area (MIA) and consid- ers the benefits of increasing irrigation efficiency. A model of the MIA which incorporates both on and off farm components is used to evaluate the bene- fits of adopting two on-farm options — twin furrow irrigation for horticul- tural farms and water reuse systems for horticulture and broadacre farms. The study found these on-farm water saving options can be profitably adopted leading to savings of river diversions of up to 27 GL a year. ABARE project 1629 1 ABARE CONFERENCE PAPER 2001.10 Introduction In recent seasons, reduced availability of irrigation water, increased water demand in agriculture and for other purposes, and the high cost of investment in new dams and associated infrastructure in the southern Murray Darling Basin (MDB), have highlighted the need to make the most efficient use of existing water resources. Improving on-farm irrigation and water use efficiency is likely to lead to a range of benefits including maintaining or increasing production from existing or less amounts of water; expanding irrigated areas; and reducing river diversions. These benefits can translate to increased income to irrigation regions. In addition to the on-farm benefits, many environmental benefits can also be obtained from improving irrigation and water use efficiency. Concerns about rising water tables contributing to waterlogging and salinity in some areas have highlighted the benefits of reducing accessions to the groundwater table. Reductions in excess water use can also minimise the movement of pesticides, nutrients and salt downstream, reducing damage to aquatic ecosystems and other downstream water users. Government initiatives, through water market reforms towards more efficient allocation and pricing of water and trade in water entitlements, combined with the increasing need to allocate water for the environment are all expected to increase the opportunity cost of irrigation water in the future. Adoption of water saving technologies and practices is one way of mitigating the negative impacts of higher water values, and at the same time leading to savings in water diversions. This paper presents some of the preliminary results from ABARE’s ongoing work on water use efficiency, focussing on the benefits of adoption of twin furrow irrigation for horticultural farms and water reuse systems. The Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area The Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area and Districts are situated between the Lachlan and Murrumbidgee Rivers in south-western New South Wales, and consist of the Yanco and 2 ABARE CONFERENCE PAPER 2001.10 Mirrool Irrigation Areas, plus the Benerembah, Tabbita and Wah Wah Irrigation Districts. Irrigated agriculture is an important contributor to regional revenue with the total irrigated output from this area estimated to be $325 million in 1997 (Hope and Wright, 1999, p.48). Of the available water saving technologies and practices, there has been limited uptake of alternative application technologies in the southern New South Wales regions. Flood/furrow irrigation is the main application method for irrigated crops on broadacre, dairy and horticulture farms in the Murrumbidgee region. In 1996-97, the average farm had 97 per cent of its irrigated pasture area and 96 per cent of its barley area irrigated by flood. The remaining irrigated pasture and barley areas were irrigated by travelling irrigators or movable sprays. Around 74 per cent of horticultural area was irrigated by flood, with the next most common irrigation system in horticulture being drip irrigation. Most of the recent uptake of alternative irrigation systems and crop water management practices has occurred on horticultural farms (Sigred Tijs, CSIRO, personal communication, July 1999). For broadacre farms, improving irrigation and soil moisture management was considered the most effective water saving approach rather than changing the water application method. This included the use of soil moisture monitoring, irrigation scheduling tools and water reuse systems (Sigred Tijs, CSIRO, personal communication, July 1999). In 1996-97, just under half of the farms in the Murrumbidgee region used some form of irrigation scheduling tool, and only 35 per cent of the total irrigated area in the Murrumbidgee region fed into a water reuse system. For irrigated broadacre and dairy farms, most of the irrigated area has been landformed in some way, however, only a small percentage is formed into beds and rows. Improvements in soil mapping through techniques such as EM31 and the use of laser levelling, allows farmers to plan their farm layout to maximise water use efficiency. The farm layout is also important for the installation of water reuse systems to maximise water saving benefits. Potential for water savings in the MIA Potential water savings exist both on and off farm within the MIA. Water balance studies carried out for the NSW Land and Water Management Plan estimate that a total of 97,000 ML of both irrigation and rain water runs off farms in the Mirrool and Yanco 3 ABARE CONFERENCE PAPER 2001.10 irrigation areas (Morgan and Glasson, 1995 and Neeson, 1995). Large area farms contributed 81 per cent of this run off volume, with the remainder coming from horticultural farms. Irrigation run off contributes 71 per cent of the total run off from large area farms compared to 82 per cent from horticultural farms. The total volume of irrigation water run off from Mirrool and Yanco areas in an average year is estimated at 71,000 ML, with an average of 28 000 ML draining back into the Murrumbidgee river, (Sinclair Knight Merz 1995). The remainder eventually drains into Barren Box Swamp at the end of the system, which is then used to supply the MIA Districts. In addition to surface water run off, the Yanco and Mirrool irrigation areas also yield approximately 34,000 ML of net ground water accessions both from irrigation water and rain fall (Morgan and Glasson, 1995 and Neeson, 1995). Part of the ground water yield from horticultural farms is drained by tile drains, which also intercepts some of the ground water inflows occurring under these farms. The tile drains are estimated to discharge around 12,000 ML of water annually to the Barren Box Swamp. Water losses also occur from the system when there is significant rainfall at key times. When on-farm water demands are met by rainfall then irrigation water is no longer required. This water then exits the system through drains or outfalls which can increase the losses for that season. The Barren Box Swamp acts as an on-line storage to store and then reuse drainage water coming from the Mirrool and Yanco irrigation areas. The Wah Wah irrigation district is supplied with regulated releases from Barren Box Swamp while the Benerambah irrigation district is supplied with drainage water from Mirrool Creak supplemented with irrigation water from the Sturt Canal. The Barren Box Swamp has a storage capacity of around 85,000 ML with overtopping occurring at 98,000 ML. The main purpose of the Barren Box Swamp is to provide on- line storage for the Wah Wah irrigation district, however as its storage capacity is larger than required for this purpose it also helps store channel escapes coming from the Mirrool and Yanco irrigation areas. Due to the expansion in irrigated agriculture in the MIA, the storage capacity of the Barren Box Swamp has fallen short of that required to store all of the inflows. Consequently, releases to the Mirrool Creek floodway have become a frequent occurrence with an estimated 43,000 ML of excess water being released annually to the 4 ABARE CONFERENCE PAPER 2001.10 Mirrool Creek floodway in recent years. In an average year, the volume of water discharged to the floodway from the Barren Box Swamp is estimated to be 25,000 ML in excess of the capacity of the floodway. The cost of flooding of the land along the floodway is estimated at $473,000 a year in 1995 (Land & Water Management Plan 1995). After netting out the benefits to some farms, which access the floodwater for irrigation, the net cost of this flooding is estimated at $378,000 a year. Most of the water spilled to the floodway is lost through seepage, escapes and evaporation while some water finds its way to the Lachlan River. The water lost through seepage may cause some environmental damage due to ground water accessions. Apart from the on-farm water losses, off-farm losses occur through seepage, leakage, evaporation and escapes from delivery channels. This, combined with the on-farm losses, and water losses through discharges to the river and floodway, constitute the real losses to the MIA and districts irrigation system. Impediments to increasing water use efficiency Physical, economic and institutional factors as well as risk affect the adoption of water saving technologies. Policies to influence the adoption of water saving technologies and management practices need to focus on the institutional impediments while considering the physical constraints. The physical constraints relate primarily to the quantity and quality of the land in a particular region and access to different sources of water. The types of technology finally adopted will be heavily influenced by a range of physical factors. These include the soil type, the suitability of the farming activities to different water application technologies and practices, and the form of delivery network in each region.