As the failed climate change conference bid hit headlines last week the nation’s Environment Minister made a quiet announcement. One hot on the heels of revelations the Murray Darling Basin continues to decline, SA Conservation Council’s Kirsty Bevan says.

Amidst all the noise of the possibility of Adelaide hosting global climate talks, and tense negotiations to reform Australia’s nature protection laws it would have been easy to miss a small but significant announcement made by Federal Environment Minister Murray Watt last fortnight.

In a room full of community and industry leaders from across the Murray-Darling Basin in Adelaide, Minister Watt announced a new round of voluntary water buybacks to return water to the environment. This wasn’t new policy; it was a commitment to implement agreed government policy by delivering on the 450 GL per year target that was promised to South Australia many years ago when the Murray Darling Basin Plan was signed into law, and on which........

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