Engineering a Crisis in a Ramsar Wetland report posted 23/11/2009 (PDF - 1.13 Mb)
"The Coorong, Lower Lakes and Murray Mouth (CLLMM) in South Australia, at the end of the Murray-Darling river system, were declared a Ramsar Wetland of International Importance in 1985. Historically, the wetland has relied on inflows from the River Murray. These began to decline after irrigated agriculture was established along the river in the late 19th Century, and seawater incursions to the CLLMM increased until construction of tidal barrages near the mouth was completed in 1939-40. Flows continued to decline with the building of dams upstream and increased diversions throughout the Murray-Darling Basin. Despite the imposition of a ‘cap’ on diversions in 1995, flows were further reduced by a decade-long drought."

Click here for full scientific report.

Meeting of the global wetland and rivers expert group (Skukuza 2009)
Communiqué on Management of environmental flows in a changing climate

• Key threats, risks and uncertainties facing biodiversity of wetlands and rivers and their conservation values;
• Understanding the spatial and temporal natural and anthropogenic drivers of aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems;
• Understanding the functioning of wetlands and rivers and the mechanisms regulating the dependency of organisms on these systems;
• Researching waterbird populations, their current status, habitat requirements and their role as indicators of river health;
• Spatial and temporal analysis of flow regimes of river systems and the relationship of these flows to the biota, including the impacts of river regulation;
• Identification of ecological values of unregulated rivers and linking of scientific research to management and policy development for river and wetland management;
• Improve the capacity to link research results in river systems to natural resource management and policy in other reserve types (e.g., terrestrial and marine systems);
• Dissemination of information through the media, electronic databases and other research outputs; and
• Strategic collaborative projects with industry (NSW Department of Environment and Climate Change; Murray-Darling Basin Commission).