Questions raised over decision to let cotton farms harvest first rainfall in years

Downstream communities furious after northern Murray-Darling Basin irrigators told harvesting embargo to be lifted

New South Wales bureaucrats sought urgent advice from major cotton farmers about how recent rainfall might damage their water harvesting infrastructure, in an apparent effort to justify giving them the green light to retain the first rainfall in over a year, rather than letting it flow downstream.

On 7 February the government announced it would restrict the harvesting of overland flows throughout the northern Murray-Darling Basin for the first time, because it was "in the public interest". But within days, the government had lifted the ban for two valleys and part of a third.