Landscape funding helps SA’s primary producers build climate resilience
Nearly $2.5 million in funding has been awarded to South Australia’s landscape boards through the Landscape Priorities Fund (LPF) to strengthen productive landscapes and biodiversity in regional areas.
More than half of the funding will be allocated to the Climate Resilience Landscapes project, which aims to help primary producers and First Nations communities plan for dry times.
Awarded $1.6 million, Climate Resilience Landscapes includes eight sub-projects - designed by the eight regional landscape boards – that are focused on water security, feral animal control, soil health and resilient farm systems. This funding includes $400,000 from the SA Drought Hub to help amplify resilience-building outcomes in line with the Hub’s objectives.
“The Climate Resilience Landscapes project shows how regional landscape boards are taking a strategic approach to building climate resilience across the state,” said Jodie Gregg-Smith, SA Arid Lands Landscape Board on behalf of landscape board General Managers.
“We’re collectively addressing a key priority while developing unique projects that align with each region’s local needs. Working together like this demonstrates the potential for future whole-of-state initiatives and addressing the bigger issues at the right scale.”
Three of the projects will tackle water use, storage and requirements, including Landscapes Hills and Fleurieu’s project that will deliver training and tools to help primary producers understand on-farm water requirements that balance environmental and production needs.
The Northern and Yorke Landscape Board’s Waterwise Farming project will develop a farm-based water audit tool to support informed water usage decisions. While Alinytjara Wiluṟara Landscape Board’s project, Water in the Desert, will deliver targeted infrastructure to capture opportunistic rain for the Anangu in the desert. This will provide emergency refuge for Anangu while also expanding the reach for buffel grass control in the Great Victoria Desert.
SA Arid Lands and Limestone Coast landscape boards will use the funds to tackle feral animal control that reduces grazing pressure and soil erosion. The funding will extend rabbit management to public land in the Limestone Coast region, while aerial mustering will support land managers to target larger numbers of unmanaged goats and ensure landscape-scale removal in the Arid Lands.
The funding will also support a cohort of primary producers to develop property management plans, improve soil health and develop management strategies that improve their capacity to adapt, diversify and build long-term resilience. The Kangaroo Island, Eyre Peninsula and Murraylands and Riverland landscape boards will offer practical knowledge through workshops, demonstration sites, planning sessions and producer-led steering groups.
LPF is sourced from landscape levies collected by Green Adelaide in the Adelaide metropolitan area and redistributed to South Australia’s regional landscape boards. It enables investment in large, landscape-scale projects that address regional and cross-regional priorities that support environmental, economic and agriculture outcomes for all South Australians.
In addition to the Climate Resilient Landscapes project, other projects funded in this LPF round include convening a two-day South Australian Aboriginal Ranger Land and Sea Conference, a project to enhance the long-term viability of the glossy black cockatoos on Kangaroo Island, management of peat soils in the lower Limestone Coast and a project to address the threat of pigs, camels, donkeys and horses to biodiversity and pastoral enterprises in the SAAL region.
Find out more about the Landscape Priorities Fund projects.
