Trade out: Victorian Environmental Water Holder sells $7.5m of excess allocation

While the Federal Government is buying irrigators’ water, Victoria’s Environmental Water Holder is selling it back to them.

Victoria’s Environmental Water Holder is putting water sales revenue into building fishways for natives - such as this young Murray Cod.

Victoria’s Environmental Water Holder has sold 37,000 megalitres of excess allocation water to irrigators for $7.5 million over the past five years, earning up to $486/ML in some years.

The VEWH has also purchased much smaller parcels of about 300ML in some years to boost environmental flows in the Maribyrnong, Moorabool, Glenelg, Wimmera and Loddon rivers.

A VEWH spokeswoman said $4.5m of the allocation sales revenue had gone towards building the $6m Koondrook Fishway, allowing native species to move between Gunbower Creek and the Murray River.

Over the past five years the VEWH has sold:

15,000ML in 2017-18 of Murray River Zone 7 allocation water for $1.9m, in 44 parcels at an average price of $127/ML;

10,000ML in 2018-19 of Zone 7 water for $4.8m, in 52 parcels at an average price of $486/ML; and

12,000ML in 2021-22 of Zone 7 water for $674,748, at an average price of $56/ML.

VEWH also purchased 314.5 ML from diversion licence holders on the Maribyrnong River in October 2021 for $23,842.

Victorian Farmers Federation water council chair Andrew Leahy said most irrigators welcomed the VEWH selling excess seasonal water allocations to irrigators, as long as the money wasn’t going straight back into the government’s coffers.

But he said the sale of excess water raised question over the Federal Government’s push to strip another 450,000ML out of irrigation communities to boost environmental flows.

“Why do you need more it you’re selling it back into the market?” Mr Leahy said.

More than 2.1 million megalitres of environmental water has already been recovered for the environment under the Murray Darlin Basin Plan, with the federal government in the midst of a water tender to buy more.

The VEWH spokeswoman said prior to trading any allocation water it assessed “potential third-party impacts ... with any significant adverse impacts minimised or avoided”.

The state-owned entity holds entitlements that deliver long-term average annual yields of 645,000 ML, which were used in combination with Commonwealth water holdings last season to deliver 994,260 ML of environment flows into Victoria’s share of the Murray Darling Basin.

That volume, which was the largest slug of environmental water to be delivered across Victorian waterways in the past decade, included 304,158 ML from the VEWH, 591,406ML from the Commonwealth Environmental Water Holder and 98,696 ML from the Living Murray program.