Consultation on the Draft Western Regional Water Strategy
Over the last few years, the NSW Government has been consulting with stakeholders and communities on a range of water-related issues in the Western Region. These issues include water resource plans, metering reforms, environmental water management, the Sustainable Diversion Limit Adjustment Mechanism program, the Better Baaka program, floodplain harvesting, connectivity, and drought.
The draft Western Regional Water Strategy was developed through targeted consultation throughout 2020, 2021 and 2022 and through a formal public exhibition period from 1 June until 13 July 2022.
The draft strategy included a set of 6 documents:
- Draft Western Regional Water Strategy Consultation Paper (PDF. 29,917 KB)
- Attachment A: Background on the Western region, its water resources and climate (PDF. 41,493 KB)
- Attachment B: Long list of options (PDF. 16,296 KB)
- Attachment C: What we heard through targeted stakeholder engagement (PDF. 1,062 KB)
- Attachment D: North-West Flow Plan discussion paper (PDF. 1,326 KB)
- Attachment E: Critical dry condition triggers to reduce risk to environmental and human water needs discussion paper (PDF. 1,438 KB)
What we heard
A comprehensive engagement and consultation program accompanied the release of the draft strategy. This included:
- face-to-face meetings
- online webinars
- formal submissions
- meetings with a Connectivity Stakeholder Reference Group.
Over 113 people attended and participated in discussions. We received:
- over 200 written and verbal comments during the meetings and through submissions,
- over 800 ideas, opportunities and challenges and suggestions,
- 29 formal submissions.
This feedback and additional analysis was used to finalise the Western Regional Water Strategy and develop the implementation plan.
A summary of what we heard is available in the document below:
Submissions
We are sharing collected community and stakeholder submissions for the region along with cultural and general submissions.
- Submission 1 (PDF 151.2 KB)
- Submission 2 (PDF 99.7 KB)
- Submission 3 (PDF 110.9 KB)
- Submission 4 Inland Rivers Network (PDF 212.2 KB)
- Submission 5 CEWO (PDF 281.5 KB)
- Submission 7 NSW Irrigators Council (PDF 628.2 KB)
- Submission 8 Brewarrina Shire Council (PDF 587.3 KB)
- Submission 9 (PDF 195.9 KB)
- Submission 10 Barwon Darling Water Inc (PDF 1.3 MB)
- Submission 11 (PDF 232.8 KB)
- Submission 12 National Parks Association of NSW (PDF 214.3 KB)
- Submission 13 Julia Imrie (PDF 160.3 KB)
- Submission 14 National Parks Association of NSW, Armidale Branch (PDF 212.1 KB)
- Submission 15 Joint Submission Broken Hill, Central Darling, Wentworth Shire Councils (PDF 1.5 MB)
- Submission 16 Bourke Shire Council (PDF 145.0 KB)
- Submission 17 Rice Growers Association of Australia (PDF 269.0 KB)
- Submission 18 Water for Rivers Sydney (PDF 976.2 KB)
- Submission 19 (PDF 110.0 KB)
- Submission 20 Nature Conservation Council of NSW (PDF 324.5 KB)
- Submission 21 (PDF 16.8 MB)
- Submission 22 Water Justice Hub (PDF 656.6 KB)
- Submission 23 Australian Floodplain Association (PDF 344.2 KB)
- Submission 24 (PDF 234.7 KB)
- Submission 25 (PDF 116.1 KB)
- Submission 26 (PDF 95.7 KB)
- Submission 27 (PDF 120.7 KB)