Resilience of eastern irrigated farm businesses

1. Resilience of eastern irrigated farm businesses Daniel Rodriguez, Don Gaydon, Brendan Power, Peter deVoil

2. paddock8 paddock3 paddock2 paddock7 Whole farm APSIM Crops Crops Residue Residue Crops Crops Weeds Weeds Residue Residue Soil Soil Weeds Weeds paddock1 paddock4 Soil Soil Pump cap. Met Waters storages Water sources Farm Manager Economics Soil Soilwat paddock5 Soil Weeds SoilN Weeds Residue Residue Soil Soil paddock6 Crops Crops Weeds Weeds Residue Residue Crops Crops

3. Planting window: Sep 15 – Oct 15 Stored water > 4ML/ha Existing farm area planted to maize or sorghum less than 50% Planting window: Oct 16 – Jan 15 Rain over 4 days > 25mm ESW > 150mm maize or sorghum area < 50% Oct 15 – Nov15 Stored water > 4ML/ha cotton area < 50% Case studies

4. Validation

5. $164/ML Value of additional water Assumption: • Current farm management and infrastructure used. • No water quality issues exist • Water delivered at no cost. • Water not immediately used is stored and is subject to drainage and evaporation losses

6. Current management* Adaptive management* Value of streamflow predictions *years when a prediction is available (about 40%)

7. Cotton row spacing, 1m or 2m?

8. 2400 ML storage cap. • ca. 1572 ML/yr • Off farm overland flow • Bores • River flow • 615 ha risk/return tradeoffs • 1300 ML storage cap. • ca. 1310 ML/yr • Off farm overland flow • Bores • 780 ha

9. Thanks.