Murray-Darling Basin Authority

The Murray-Darling Basin Authority launched 'The Living Murray Story', a detailed look at the history and achievements of one of Australia's largest river restoration projects.

Last week I went onto the Chowilla floodplain in a little tinny...We went to a site up in the north-western end of Chowilla. That site would have had literally thousands of dead trees ringing it, including tens if not 100-plus trees that were clearly well in excess of 100 years old.

Contrast that with a site that we also motored into that we secured water for through The Living Murray...and basically that site would have been dead too if The Living Murray had not existed. That's probably the most stark example that I can give you of the success of the program through what has been an incredibly difficult period of prolonged drought.

We don't have to wait for any monitoring advice: sites like that would be dead now. You can't recover from dead.

(Judy Goode, former long-term member of The Living Murray Environmental Watering Group)

Over the past decade and through the worst drought on record, The Living Murray program has attempted to restore the health of the River Murray by returning water to the environment and building infrastructure to efficiently deliver water to the Murray's wetlands, floodplains and forests.

The Living Murray story is not just about the river, but also about the many people who have worked to make the vision of the program a reality. These include community members, ricegrowers, scientists, Aboriginal people and land managers.

This book is a timely summary of how an environmental water recovery program has played a critical role in all sections of the river community.

The Living Murray program is a joint initiative funded by the New South Wales, Victorian, South Australian, Australian Capital Territory and the Commonwealth governments, coordinated by the Murray-Darling Basin Authority.

The book is free and can be ordered from the publications section of the Murray-Darling Basin Authority website (www.mdba.gov.au/services/publications/more-information?publicationid=108)