Macquarie Update 17 June 2013 Podcast Script

Annette: We are talking today with Rob Hoogers, Project Officer in the Macquarie Valley, about how the projects who were successful in getting funding in  Round 1 of the Sustaining the Basin Irrigated Farm Modernisation project are progressing.

Rob: I can report some welcome wet weather in the Macquarie Valley, with up to 100 mm of rain in the lower Macquarie giving most of the winter cropping areas a really great start. This wet weather has slowed progress in the irrigation development works. We have 13 projects approved in round 1 running in the Macquarie Valley. Contractors are very busy with projects that have started. We’ve got four storages, two drip systems and a centre pivot redevelopment. These projects, two of them are all but done.

Quarterly reports are coming in with most jobs ahead of schedule, or on track. Earthworks for a lot of these projects are well up to date before the rain.

It’s a very busy time around the Narromine Warren area for contractors, with lateral moves and other drip systems going in as well.

Annette: So Rob, you mentioned a couple of projects are nearing completion can you give us a bit more detail on those?

Rob: Yeah, well most of our projects are well ahead. Our approval process was timed so that growers could get into it as soon as they finished their cotton harvest and got one centre pivot upgrade where the mains are all pressurised and she’ll be a goer within a week. So that one will be paid up and finished.

We’ve got a couple of storages where all the earthworks are done. One of them has just about finished the pipe works, once the weather dries out a bit. So they will be finished probably 6 months ahead of time. So some really substantial works. Of course earthworks will probably pause now for about a month, but most growers have really got stuck into it and are well ahead of time.

Annette: Fantastic!

This has been Annette McCaffery with an update from Rob Hoogers about the successful projects in the Macquarie Valley funded through the Australian Government’s Water for the Future Initiative. Good afternoon.