March 19, 2026
The Murray-Darling Basin Authority are calling on the community to share your views on the 2026 Basin Plan Review.
To manage the Murray-Darling Basin, the Australian Government works with 5 state and territory governments including: Victoria, New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia and Australian Capital Territory. The Basin state governments manage the water in their own area, in line with nationally agreed principles and plans.
The purpose of the Murray-Darling Basin Plan, made in law in 2012, was to improve the health of the Basin’s rivers and groundwater systems. The Plan according to MDBA is “a collective response to a national crisis in water management revealed by the Millennium drought.”
Since 2012, the operating environment of the Basin Plan has changed immensely and the review aims to address this. This includes increased knowledge, a maturing environmental water portfolio, a greater focus on accountability and compliance, a maturing approach to First Nations peoples’ involvement, increasing importance of landscape level approach and a constrained fiscal environment.
According to the MDBA, the review will examine ways to build on the successes of the Plan, evaluating what’s working and identify where change is needed to manage water more efficiently. It will also consider the evidence and latest science to inform how to respond to a changing climate, including hotter, drier weather and more extreme droughts. Finally, the views of Basin communities will be considered to inform the next decade of managing the Basin.
The 2026 Basin Plan Review provides an opportunity to improve how the Basin is managed, and determine what changes can be made to ensure the Plan works as effectively as possible to achieve its intended outcomes.
The findings of the review will result in recommendations to Basin governments on how the plan should be adapted.
Public consultation closes 1 May 2026.
When reading through the Discussion Paper, the community are asked to consider the following feedback questions:
- What do you think of the issues and options presented?
- Are there other issues and options that should be considered?
- What do you see as the priorities and why?
LET VRFISH KNOW YOUR THOUGHTS
VRFish would like to hear your views so that we can incorporate your ideas into a VRFish submission. You can do this by dropping us a line at [email protected]
