Political fragmentation and land use changes in the Interior Plains

Recent years have witnessed growing interest in the critical role of local/regional governance structures in shaping physical land development and associated natural resource management processes. This article investigates how political fragmentation in local governance can affect land use patterns through a watershed-level analysis of population and employment density changes in the Interior Plains, the largest physiographic division of the US. Population density change rates are found to be negatively associated with a higher degree of political fragmentation, while employment density does not show such a clear relationship with political fragmentation. This finding shows that political fragmentation may present significant challenges to land and water resource management, a result consistent with the previous empirical research

'Missing the Connection: How SRLU Policy fragments landscapes and communities in NSW'

The authors of this piece critique the recent land use planning reforms in NSW, particularly the Policy regarding Strategic Regional Land Use Plans (SRLUP). Taking the Upper Hunter SRLUP as an example, the authors contend that the stated objectives of the Policy cannot be achieved through its current design. To the contrary, the policy fails to protect established regional land use values and contains significant risk to the environmental conditions in which those values operate

\u27Not just drought.\u27 Drought, rural change and more: perspectives from rural farming communities

The \u27Big Dry\u27, a prolonged dry period in Australia from 1997 to 2009, seared much of the Murray-Darling Basin region and resulted in large agricultural losses, degraded river systems and increased uncertainty in rural communities although climate change in the form of drought is not new to rural Australia (Wei et al . 2012). For many years, generations of Australian farmers and farming communities have battled such climatic extremes. However, the most recent drought event competed with a myriad of changes to their lives and as such, the façade of stoicism has slowly begun to crack. This chapter examines the changes exacerbated by drought occurring in rural Victoria and considers the challenges facing both rural towns and farming families, whose economic future and social well-being are predominantly associated with agriculture. By drawing on locally situated knowledge from case studies of the rural towns of Mildura and Donald, this chapter shows how issues such as reduced water supply, increasing agricultural costs, farm succession and cumulative uncertainty are affecting the ongoing viability of people living off the land in these drought-affected rural areas. Like many other rural towns in Australia where agriculture is a mainstay, Mildura and Donald are experiencing a combination of strains on their communities, townships, farms, and farming families. These pressures arise not only from drought but also from extensive changes to local communities and farming enterprises that include: a rapidly evolving water market, the increasing competition of commodity markets, wide-ranging rural demographic shifts, and changing rural service provision and investment. Drought and the effects of longterm drying of these agricultural regions represent just one challenge amongst a melee of change. In the oft-repeated words of residents from these rural communities, the problems they are confronting are \u27not just drought\u27, they are a combination of \u27drought and more\u27 which make successful adaptation all the more difficult, particularly when current policy regimes remain inadequate and local experiences little understood (Sherval and Askew 2012). This chapter seeks to extend our understanding of the issues facing both these drought-sensitive regions and those like them throughout Australia today by exploring the diverse, changing and sometimes strained contexts of rural towns and communities. It suggests that any future provision of support to communities throughout ongoing and future changes will require a holistic approach, rather than one that visualises drought as a once off, crisis-ridden event as government support schemes traditionally have done. Overall, this chapter seeks to develop the discussion surrounding drought impacts, and their embeddedness within a myriad of other rural changes and challenges, by drawing on locally situated knowledge to inform future decision-making nationally in this evolving, yet vital arena

Drought and the future of rural communities: drought impacts and adaptation in regional Victoria, Australia

The National Climate Change Research Facility (NCCARF) is undertaking a program of Synthesis and Integrative Research to synthesise existing and emerging national and international research on climate change impacts and adaptation. The purpose of this program is to provide decision-makers with the information they need to manage the risks of climate change. This report on drought and the future of rural communities in regional Victoria forms part of a series of studies/reports commissioned by NCCARF that look at historical extreme weather events, their impacts and subsequent adaptations. These studies examine particular events - primarily extremes - and seek to explore prior vulnerabilities and resilience, the character and management of the event, subsequent adaptation and the effects on present-day vulnerability. The reports should inform thinking about adapting to climate change - that is, capacity to adapt, barriers to adaptation, and translating capacity into action. While it is recognised that the comparison is not, and never can be, exact, the over-arching goal is to better understand the requirements of successful adaptation to future climate change. This report compares the impact of drought in two agricultural communities, Mildura and Donald. The Big Dry, or Millennium Drought, has affected southeast Australia since the mid-1990s. Although there has been a return to wet La Niña conditions, it will be several seasons before conditions will return to \u27normal\u27. This drought had serious impacts on water availability, agricultural production (due to decreased irrigation allocations), biodiversity (due to prolonged changes in habitats) and bushfire regimes. Two case studies (Mildura and Donald) were chosen to investigate the socio-economic impacts of drought, past and present drought adaptation measures, and the future adaptation strategies that will be required to deal with projected increases to the frequency and magnitude of drought events

Becoming Reading Group: reflections on assembling a collegiate, caring collective

In neoliberalising universities, collegial and collective practices such as reading groups are often positioned by students, staff and managers as less important than meeting individual KPIs (such as producing research publications, seeking research grants, or meeting the increasing demands of producing quality teaching outcomes.) However, reading groups can be vital for cultivating caring collectives and spaces of collegiality. In this paper we use assemblage thinking to explore 25 years of a Geography reading group at the University of Newcastle. The paper addresses two questions: what does reading together do and make possible; and how might we think about the labours of reading together as a way of building caring collectives. The paper draws on reflections from 24 past and present members of reading group to explore how these kinds of academic practices nourish our working lives

Becoming reading group : reflections on assembling a collegiate, caring collective

In neoliberalising universities, collegial and collective practices such as reading groups are often positioned by students, staff and managers as less important than meeting individual KPIs (such as producing research publications, seeking research grants, or meeting the increasing demands of producing quality teaching outcomes.) However, reading groups can be vital for cultivating caring collectives and spaces of collegiality. In this paper we use assemblage thinking to explore 25 years of a Geography reading group at the University of Newcastle. The paper addresses two questions: what does reading together do and make possible; and how might we think about the labours of reading together as a way of building caring collectives. The paper draws on reflections from 24 past and present members of reading group to explore how these kinds of academic practices nourish our working lives

Becoming Reading Group: reflections on assembling a collegiate, caring collective

In neoliberalising universities, collegial and collective practices such as reading groups are often positioned by students, staff and managers as less important than meeting individual KPIs (such as producing research publications, seeking research grants, or meeting the increasing demands of producing quality teaching outcomes.) However, reading groups can be vital for cultivating caring collectives and spaces of collegiality. In this paper we use assemblage thinking to explore 25 years of a Geography reading group at the University of Newcastle. The paper addresses two questions: what does reading together do and make possible; and how might we think about the labours of reading together as a way of building caring collectives. The paper draws on reflections from 24 past and present members of reading group to explore how these kinds of academic practices nourish our working lives