Dealing with salinity in Wheatbelt Valleys - Department of Water

Frost and Burnside
INTRODUCTION
We begin with two quotes:
" …..that the people here may flourish and develop
the resources and turn the desert into the smiling
plain, and build a great country and make it a worthy
off shoot of the great Empire whence our fathers
came." (Sir John Forrest 1892 as reported in
Crowley 2000).
"In the 1920s the Western Australian Governments
of the day had sought investment in order to settle
farming families on the marginal lands of the
Wheatbelt and the groups settlements of the South-
West, with the aim of increasing and diversifying the
State’s productivity, as well as providing the farmers
and their families with opportunities for betterment.
These goals were hopelessly misguided because they
were based on inadequate and over-hopeful
estimates of agricultural capacity." (Bolton 1994,
p.xi).
The history of European farming in the wheatbelt
valleys neatly fits into the 20 th Century,
commencing with the land settlement schemes
initiated by the first responsible State Government,
which were continued with enthusiasm by
subsequent Governments (as circumstances
allowed) almost into the 1990s. Political leaders
like Sir John Forrest created the structures for
agricultural settlement that Governments led by
Sir James Mitchell and Phillip Collier used to
ensure that the wheatbelt valleys, by the late
1920s, looked like they do today. But at what
cost? Commencing with the onset of the
Depression in 1929, and lasting through to the
early 1950s, wheatbelt agriculture struggled to
support those directly dependent on it, let alone
contribute to the greater good of the State’s
welfare in the manner predicted by the likes of
Forrest and Mitchell (Snooks 1981).
The story of wheatbelt agriculture over the last
100 years has varied between these two poles of
unbridled optimism and sober reflection as
illustrated in the two quotes. The awareness of
the likely impact of rising saline watertables in the
wheatbelt valleys can be viewed as simply the
latest and by no means the most difficult challenge
facing the people who have lived and worked in
these lands.
– 2 –
WHY FARM THE WHEATBELT VALLEYS?
Until the gold-rushes beginning in the 1880s,
Western Australia was a small and poor
component of the British Empire. In 1880, the
European population of just under 30,000 survived
on a subsistence agriculture with the main exports
being wool and timber. The population was hardly
growing and capital investment was very low
(Appleyard 1981).
The pastoral phase
During the period from 1830 to 1890, Aboriginal
occupancy of the wheatbelt valleys was replaced
by sandalwood cutters and pastoralists. The
former were successful, and sandalwood
production for export grew rapidly. However, its
exploitation peaked in 1848 as the stands of the
timber were depleted in the more accessible areas
(Statham 1981). Pastoralism in these areas was
less successful, and most interest in pastoral
development focused on the more grassy lands of
the Kimberley, Pilbara and Murchison (Burvill
1979a) which were easier to develop for grazing
and where water was more readily available than
in the densely wooded lands east of the Avon
Valley. The difficulty of obtaining quality
underground water and problems with poisonous
plants of the Oxylobium and Gastrolobium genera
were further barriers to pastoral development.
Overall, development of these areas for timber
harvesting and pastoral grazing was not very
successful (Appleyard 1981). The need to clear
the land for crop production as a spur to economic
development was recognised. However, until the
gold rushes of the 1890s, the relatively
impoverished State lacked both the labour and the
ability to raise the capital needed to commence
large-scale development.
From gold to agriculture
Western Australia experienced rapid growth
between the late 1880s and World War I, as
shown in Table 1. This period coincided with the
granting of responsible government to the Colony
in 1890, gold discoveries, first in the Kimberley and
then in the Murchison and Goldfields, and the
Federation of the colonies to form the
Commonwealth of Australia.
The rapid expansion in population as a result of the
gold discoveries, and the development of many
new population centres in the remote part of the
State stressed the Government’s ability to provide