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RESEARCH ARTICLE
Contents Vol 46(9)

Understanding farmers’ monitoring of water tables for salinity management

S. P. Marsh A C , M. P. Burton A and D. J. Pannell A B
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- Author Affiliations

A School of Agricultural and Resource Economics, University of Western Australia, Crawley, WA 6009, Australia.

B CRC for Plant-Based Management of Dryland Salinity, University of Western Australia, Crawley, WA 6009, Australia.

C Corresponding author. Email: spmarsh@cyllene.uwa.edu.au

Australian Journal of Experimental Agriculture 46(9) 1113-1122 https://doi.org/10.1071/EA04185
Submitted: 30 August 2004  Accepted: 18 November 2005   Published: 4 August 2006

Abstract

Given the prominence of dryland salinity as a resource management problem in Australia, it might be expected that farmers would keenly monitor the levels of saline groundwater under their farms. However, many farmers choose not to monitor, in some cases even when they have previously installed bores suitable for this purpose. We investigated this apparent paradox by analysing the monitoring behaviour of a group of farmers in the Jerramungup region of southern Western Australia. The farmers are unusual in displaying a very high rate of monitoring compared with other regions, although this rate has fallen over the past decade. A range of physical, economic and social influences on monitoring behaviour are identified by statistical analysis of survey and physical data. A key finding is that farmers who are using the information from monitoring to assess salinity management strategies implemented on their farms are likely to monitor more frequently. This suggests that monitoring frequency may be driven in large part by the availability of suitable salinity management practices that can be implemented, in contrast to the view that adoption of salinity management practices may be enhanced by programs that encourage monitoring.


Acknowledgments

The authors acknowledge the contributions to this work of Don McFarlane and Arjen Ryder (Department of Agriculture Western Australia), Carolyn Daniel (Jerramungup LCDC) and farmers in the Jerramungup LCD, particularly Bob Twigg and Geoff Bee. Thanks also to 3 anonymous reviewers who provided very helpful comments on the paper. The authors gratefully acknowledge funding from the Grains Research and Development Corporation.


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