Identify Management Setting
An important part of a conjunctive water management approach is to identify the management setting within the catchment. This identifies the working environment, scoping out the priority catchment management issues and the factors that have an impact on their solution. This includes identifying existing:
- Catchment Issues, answering the question of what are the key issues facing the sustainability of land and water resources in the catchment. The nature and scope of conjunctive water management in a catchment can be tailored to address these management issues, whether they are over-extraction of water, river salinity or ecosystem health. The scale of the issues must be understood to allow for a prioritised approach;
- Water Users, as the potential impacts on water users need to be addressed and water users should be engaged in the planning process. Often catchment issues are perceived differently by different groups of people and different perceptions about their severity are easily formed;
- Resource Development, defining the degree of extraction of surface water and groundwater in the catchment and the nature and extent of existing infrastructure. The extent of the use and development of water resources in a catchment dictates how conjunctive management can be applied. This also relates to the extent and nature of land use and development; and
- Planning and Policy, to outline the existing legislation, policy and rules that define or impact on operational water management. The existing administrative environment can provide opportunities or constraints to implementing conjunctive water management and can involve many government and non-government agencies.