Limits to adaptation: Reducing irrigation water in the Murray-Darling Basin dairy communities

Increasing environmental disasters are creating significant uncertainty for farm families and their communities across the world. One site critically affected is the Murray-Darling Basin area of Australia, an area known as the food bowl of Australia. Following a lengthy drought at the turn of the century concerns were raised about water quality and river health. This led successive governments to introduce policies to systematically reduce water available for irrigated agriculture. The Murray-Darling Basin Plan was developed by the Commonwealth government and is designed to secure water savings from irrigators and to direct those water savings to the stressed natural environment. This paper focuses on the impact of these changes on irrigation dairy families and their communities in northern Victoria. Using a model designed to test the limits to adaptation, we draw out the constraints, limits and barriers to adaptation for dairy families and their communities coping with reduced water access. This model highlights the types of socially just and fair interventions necessary to assist adaptation and focuses attention on thresholds and traps that may prevent adaptation. The model is relevant to other areas where climate changes and environmental disasters are shaping inevitable change. •Greater attention to the social implications of environmental threats.•Give insights into the constraints, barriers and limits to adaptation.•Assess traps and thresholds which may restrict or facilitate adaptation.•Outline socially just interventions designed to address social impacts.