Salinity Management
Salinity Indicator Plants | Method for Assessing Dryland Salinity | Indicators of Urban Salinity | Mapping Soil Salinity using Satellite Imagery
Innovative Management Technologies | Forage Options | Benchmarking Watertables | Interaction between Groundwater Surface Systems in Northern Victoria
Dryland Salinity in Victoria in 2007 | The Salinity Monitoring Network in Victoria, Standards & Procedures
| Since European settlement, the replacement of native vegetation with crops and pastures, and the rise of irrigation developments have resulted in changes to the water balance. Throughout many areas of Victoria, this changed water balance has seen an increase in the height of saline groundwater, resulting in groundwater discharging to the surface in some areas. Discharge areas become saline, often waterlogged, support only salt tolerant vegetation, and suffer from soil erosion. Rising groundwater is as much an environmental problem as an issue to agriculture and urban areas. Salt Action-Joint Action - the Victorian Salinity Strategy In May 1988, the government released the Victorian Salinity Strategy, Salt Action-Joint Action, for tackling the growing salinity problems in the state. This strategy set out a systematic program for developing community-led Salinity Management Plans (SMPs) for salt affected regions. Map of extent of dryland salinity in Victoria on the DSE website (external link) Since the establishment of Victoria's salinity management program in 1998, the State Government, supported by the Commonwealth, has worked in partnership with communities to develop and implement Salinity Management Plans. 22 Salinity Management Plans (SMPs) have been developed by Community Groups for much of Victoria. Over the past 10 years, 22 Salinity Management Plans (SMPs) have been developed by Community Groups for much of Victoria. Victoria's Salinity Management Framework In 2000, the State Government released the document: Salinity Management in Victoria: Future Directions (external link). This document provides an initial assessment of the challenges and proposed future directions for salinity management in Victoria. In August 2000, the Minister for Environment and Conservation released Victoria's Salinity Management Framework -Restoring our Catchments (external link) to help address Victoria's $50 million a year salinity problem. Victoria's Salinity Management Framework will provide a statewide plan for protecting Victoria's environment from salinity. |  Groundwater hydrologic cycle - recharge, discharge and salinity processes Diagram: Simon Kneebone, 1988 Click on the diagram to view a larger resolution (26K)  Community consultation ensured the success of the Sunraysia Community Working Group's Salinity Management Plan in the early 1990s Photo: Steve Page |
The overall goal of the State Salinity Strategy, is to manage the salinity of land and water resources throughout Victoria in order to maintain, and where feasible, to improve the social well-being of communities and the environmental quality and productive capacity of the regions.
Specific state-wide salinity control objectives are:
- to stabilise watertables at harmless levels in irrigation areas with good quality groundwater
- to significantly retard rising groundwater by control of groundwater recharge, and where necessary to adapt to higher saline conditions in irrigation areas with saline groundwater
- to significantly reduce accessions to the groundwater systems and to substantially improve salinity problems associated with localised groundwater systems
- to protect, and where appropriate, rehabilitate high value wetlands and other significant environmental features.
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© The State of Victoria, 1996 - 2009.
This document was last reviewed on 29/05/2009