Fitzroy River in the dry season.

In March 2007, EK and the Australian Conservation Foundation launched the Kimberley Freshwater Campaign with the aim of securing long-term legal protection for the Fitzroy River in a way that is consistent with Traditional Owners’ rights and interests. View media release (22 March 2007).

The river and its people

The Fitzroy River is the mightiest river in the Kimberley in terms of catchment area, length and flow. It is highly significant from an environmental and cultural perspective. The ecology of the river is adapted to annual floods, which bring large volumes of fresh water and sediment down the Fitzroy River during the wet season, both being important to the ecology of King Sound.  There are 40 species of fish that live in the river for at least part of their lifecycle. The river also supports one of the largest known viable populations of the endangered Freshwater sawfish.

Fitzroy River

A number of Indigenous language groups – including Mangala, Walmajarri, Nyikina, Wangkajunga, Ngarinyin, Bunuba and Gooniyandi - depend on the river for their livelihood. The Traditional Owners of the various reaches have a close affinity with and understanding of the river and its ecology. Aboriginal people consider the permanent pools in the Fitzroy as ‘living water’. The river is also a popular fishing and camping spot for Kimberley residents and visitors.

Traditional Owners Leena Fraser and Lucy Marshall.

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Threats to the river

However, the Fitzroy River has been targeted by developers over the past decade for cotton-growing, dam and canal proposals.

View the history of the campaign to protect the Fitzroy River here.

Not long after the launch of the Kimberley Freshwater Campaign the-then WA Opposition Leader Paul Omodei announced that, if a Liberal government was elected at the next state election, it would pursue a 20-year plan to drought-proof WA with water from the Fitzroy River, establish large-scale irrigation schemes along the river, dam the upper reaches and pipe water to Perth. EK, ACF and the KLC immediately rubbished the proposal as both irresponsible and ill-conceived (see joint EK/ACF media release 1 May 2007).

Map© EcoMap 2006 Click to enlarge map

Former ALP Government position

The former WA Minister for Water Resources, John Kobelke, reiterated the Carpenter Government’s position that bringing Kimberley water to Perth would be far too costly. During a speech in the Legislative Assembly in 2007 he said that the only way Fitzroy and Ord River water should be used by the south-west of the state was to allow the water to flow into the Indian Ocean and then be desalinated when it reaches Perth.  And in a letter to Environs Kimberley and the Australian Conservation Foundation the Minister stated: “The Government…recognises the potential adverse environmental and cultural consequences of large-scale developments that could involve damming the Fitzroy River or extracting large amounts of groundwater from its alluvial aquifers”.

The Minister also indicated he was bringing forward the timetable for a Kimberley regional water planning process, which he said would address the concerns that conservation groups had about the future of the Fitzroy River.

See the Department of Water’s depiction of the main aspects of the regional water planning process here.

A new Government - what now?
Since the change to a Liberal-led state government under Colin Barnett in September 2008, there have been few indicators as to whether there will be a new policy direction for the Fitzroy River. During the election campaign Mr Barnett pronounced on National Radio that the Kimberley-Perth canal proposal, which he had vigorously supported to his detriment during the 2005 election, was now ‘stone motherless dead’. A Fitzroy River dam was not included in the Liberal Party’s 2008 election platform.

Meanwhile, the National Party, which is now in government with the Liberals, declared that it would not support any party that wanted to dam the Fitzroy. It increasingly appears that a dam is off the immediate agenda of the new government, especially as attention is focused on expanding the Ord Irrigation Project. However, long-term legal protection from dams, canals and large-scale irrigation schemes is still needed to provide the Fitzroy River and catchment with the level of environmental security it deserves.

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Kimberley Water Forum

Indigenous organisations, government agencies and environmental groups, including Environs Kimberley and ACF, collaborated to hold the Kimberley Water Forum in March 2008 to help lay the groundwork for the planning process (see media release 13 March 2008).

View  the Kimberley Freshwater Campaign presentation to the Forum here.

Dr Gary Scott, Freshwater Campaigner, at the Kimberley Water Forum.

WA Water Reform

For the last two years, the WA Government has been in the process of drafting important new water legislation, which in part needs to be introduced to meet the requirements of the Commonwealth’s National Water Initiative. The new legislation will replace the water resource management provisions in outdated acts like the Rights in Water and Irrigation Act 1914.

From a conservation perspective it is important that the new legislation allows the Minister for Water Resources to declare waterways with high conservation and cultural values, such as the Fitzroy River, to be ‘significant’. This then ought to require a catchment management regime to be put in place that maintains and enhances these values, with a high level of involvement by the region’s Aboriginal people an absolute must. Native title rights to water also need to be adequately recognised and defined in the new legislation so that Aboriginal communities receive equitable outcomes from any future water allocation plans.

Towards long-term legal protection

Other legal measures that should be investigated by the WA and/or Commonwealth Governments include:

• additional Indigenous Protected Areas and joint-management of conservation reserves;
• an Environmental Protection Policy for the Fitzroy River Catchment;
• national heritage listing;
• Ramsar listing for internationally significant wetlands;
• Critical habitat listing to protect the habitat of the endangered Freshwater sawfish and Northern river shark

In order to secure the long-term future of the Fitzroy River, any legal measures would  need to achieve the following goals:

• provide statutory protection for the river.
• recognise native title rights and associated Traditional Owner interests.
• establish a governance framework based on partnership – co-management sufficient funding.
• prohibit some damaging activities in Fitzroy River Catchment (e.g. dams, weirs, broad-scale land clearing, large-scale water extraction).
• maintain bottom-line ecological thresholds and ensure protection of cultural values.

“The Fitzroy River is a part of us and we are part of the Fitzroy. If we look after the Fitzroy, it will look after us” – Wayne Bergmann, Kimberley Land Council.

Fitzroy River fishway project

In September, 2008 Environs Kimberley received funding from Rangelands WA to undertake a scoping study that will examine how a fishway could be constructed on the Fitzroy River at the Camballin Barrage.

Scientists have found that the Camballin Barrage on the Fitzroy River, built in the early 1960s for a failed irrigation project, is a barrier for fish swimming upstream. Freshwater Sawfish, Cherabin, Barramundi and Diamond Mullet - to name a few of the affected species that live in the river - are getting trapped below the barrage as the river flow drops and are being exposed to greater fishing pressure. They are also more likely to be eaten by bull sharks and crocodiles when they become trapped.

A fishway would allow fish species, including the Freshwater sawfish, which is a listed Commonwealth threatened species, to swim upstream for an extra few months of the year. This would allow a greater chance of breeding success.

EK is  currently working with the Yiriman Project and local Indigenous rangers to consult with the community about the proposed fishway. We would very much like to hear your views on the issue.

For more information about the fishway project click here.

To view the Murdoch University report on the impacts of the Camballin Barrage on fish communities in the Fitzroy River click here.

Camballin Barrage – the only significant artificial structure preventing the natural flow of the Fitzroy River

Take Action!

Selected Kimberley Rivers and Waters Bibliography
Compiled by Sandy Toussaint, University of Western Australia.
Suggestions for new additions to the bibliography are welcome. 
Please contact EK: Ph. 08 9192 1922 or email. ekfreshwater@westnet.com.au

Fitzroy River campaign pamphlet (August 2007) (pdf 1.45Mb)
Ask the WA Premier to protect the Fitzroy River by sending the snip-off section in this pamphlet to Environs Kimberley. We will send it on to the Premier.
Campaign pamphlet copyright note: Imagery copyright - Commonwealth of Australia - Geoscience Australia, 2000. Map Copyright - EcoMap, 2006.

Other Links
Australian Conservation Foundation’s work in the Kimberley: www.acfonline.org.au/default.asp?section_id=77

Kimberley Land Council – Land and Sea Management Unit
http://www.klc.org.au/projects.htm

Department of Water (WA) website
www.water.wa.gov.au

Acknowledgements
The Kimberley Freshwater Campaign is supported by the Australian Conservation Foundation. Funding has also been provided by the Mullum Trust.

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© Environs Kimberley