Horticulture growers in the Granite Belt and eastern Darling Downs region will benefit from on-farm support and assistance to improve their water and energy efficiency through the state Government’s Rural Water Use Efficiency Initiative (RWUEI) funding.
Growcom has been provided with $300,000 in RWUEI funding to deliver the project to those horticulture growers in the Granite Belt and eastern Darling Downs regions currently experiencing reduced water allocations. Assistance will be available through irrigation, pump & fertigation assessments, Hort360 BMP as well as providing technical specialist advice at workshops and on-farm.
Water access and pump related energy continue to be a major issues across all horticultural operations with good irrigation management practices strongly linked to improvements in crop quality and quantity. The valuable services delivered through RWUEI will support horticulture growers as they continue to improve on farm water and energy efficiencies while moving to a more sustainable resource management plan.
As the RWUEI program enters its 18th year Growcom would like to thank the Queensland State Government for the long-term investment. Through the RWUEI program Growcom has:
- Assisted horticulture growers repurpose 11,000ML of irrigation water.
- Delivered workshops to over 10,000 attendees.
- Developed a large range of resources.
- Assisted more than 1600 growers access incentives to improve management practices with a more than three to one return on investment for every dollar invested by government.
RWUEI has proven to be a successful delivery model to enable growers to make effective change, build capacity within the community and provide sound return on investment for all parties concerned. Through this model Growcom will continue to work with government to implement change management within the horticulture sector.
There still, however, remains a significant question over whether RWUEI will receive future funding so it can continue to deliver the efficiencies and results to date right across the state’s irrigated agricultural industries. Growcom joins with Queensland Farmers’ Federation (QFF) in calling on all levels of government to continue to acknowledge the role of irrigated agriculture in supplying food, fibre and foliage and the income it generates, particularly in regional communities post 2017-18.
