NEW dams were not to be investigated by the taskforce looking at developing northern Australia as the country's next big food bowl, it was alleged in parliament this week.
The news comes following the disappointing findings by the committee revealing Australia's north will never be a big food production hub, despite its abundance of rain and market potential with its proximity to Asia.
The report by the Northern Australia Land and Water taskforce was tabled by Parliamentary Secretary for Northern Australia Gary Gray on Monday, and virtually knocked on the head any hopes of developing the north with new Ord-like water storages and infrastructure projects.
It dashed large-scale river irrigation hopes, pointing instead to working more with groundwater to encourage "mosaic" farming development.
At the Prime Minister's 2020 summit in 2008, developing northern Australia as the food bowl of Asia was one of the key agricultural "visions" put forward by rural delegates.
The taskforce was first established by the previous Howard Government in 2007 with a $30 million budget to commission studies and explore some frontier potential for agriculture to remove pressure from Australia's ailing Murray Darling Basin, which is home to more than 60 per cent of Australia's food production.
Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, re-jigged the taskforce in 2008, stripping it of all but about $1 million, and giving it a more environmental focus which has been harshly criticised by the Opposition.
It emerged in Senate Estimates this week that the taskforce was told it would not be necessary to look at the need to develop more dams, and the report out this week suggested the North's topography and rainfall patterns would not make dam building suitable.
Queensland Liberal Senator, Ian Macdonald, said the report was "meaningless" and "inconsequential", while his NSW counterpart, Bill Heffernan – who initially chaired the taskforce – said the taskforce should have looked more outside the square and been more forward thinking to investigate new ideas and opportunities.
He said the taskforce only looked at old science and did not think more broadly about new ways you could store water in the north if dams weren't appropriate.
National Farmers Federation president, David Crombie, said it wasn't all bad news for the north with the recommendation for more science and research a good thing, he believed.
He said the report highlighted strong prospects for expanding the northern pastoral industry with big opportunities highlighted for already strong cattle sector.
But much better infrastructure and a streamlining of regulations cross-border were vital, he added.
Cattle production across the north of Queensland, the Northern Territory and Northern WA could be doubled according to the report, and be worth four times as much.
Existing regulations would have to be relaxed so production was made easier, farmers have said in response.
Minister for Agriculture, Tony Burke, said some people had built a level of expectation for the north that was "never going to be fulfilled".
"It was never going to be the case that the north of Australia would replace the MDB," Mr Burke said.
"But it is the case that more can be done in the north than has been done there in the past.
"Everyone always knew the soils were a significant limitation, the fact that most of the rainfall came in a few months of the year was a massive limitation as well.
"This report goes a little bit further into showing how few places there are where you could actually dam and store significant water.
"My view is this offers a little bit more hope for the north than what many people thought was going to be there."
He said the challenge with new infrastructure would be the big wet seasons each year which would treat that infrastructure very harshly.
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