Minimum acceptable standards are currently used as a threshold in Reef Water Quality Risk Framework( Anon., no date). In recent years it has become accepted that financial incentives for grazing land management practices should not be paid unless grazing land has achieved C class management. The minimum acceptable standards for management practices in the LDC incentives project, considering both the intent of the Reef Water Quality Program as well as legacy issues associated with gullies are suggested as:
Grazing management practices: Grazing management practices need to be at least C class for incentives to be considered. D class management is below expectations of maintaining‘ duty of care’. Graziers in the BBB catchment who are over-stocked are more likely to carry high levels of farm debt and be reluctant to reduce cattle numbers in time of drought from work conducted by Romy Greiner( Waterhouse et al., 2017); as such these landholders are likely to have greater worries than long-term land management and payment of financial incentives is unlikely to be sufficient to change their overall management in the long term.
Gully management( hillslope and alluvial): Gully activity and scale is largely a function of land and soil type and involves the role of a land-use trigger at some point over the last ~ 100 years. All parts of the landscape are not equally susceptible. Some of the most degraded properties from a grazing management practice point of view do not have gullies and vice versa. Whilst stocking rates need to be considered as part of overall strategy, for the purpose of reducing sediment loads effectively, gully treatment and grazing should be treated largely independently( Andrew Brooks, personal communication). The only minimum requirement for gullies to be at least considered for incentives would be that the landholder has to at least maintain a fence around the gully.
Streambank erosion: Many graziers have partially fenced off larger waterways already( Park and Dickson, 2015). Considering provision of incentives at this C class level will reward landholders who have already shown commitment to works( provided there are not issues of significant disadoption). The argument is that benefits will be gained through completing waterway fencing.. It is not recommended that incentives should be provided where there is no previous riparian fencing( D class practice). Assumed minimum practice standards are shown in column 3 in Table 1.
Improved practice It is assumed that the improved practice for which incentives would be considered is indicative B practice( recognising the limitations of ABCD in gully management practice thinking), and where possible( e. g. if innovative remediation practices are found) A class. For gullies where there is confidence that gullies are operating independently of stocking rates this principle may be relaxed.
Public net benefits, private net benefits, estimated technical feasibility, adoptability, nonprofit-related barriers and costs
The assumptions around each of the management practices are outlined below. Note that results from the grazing management WQIP workshop( Park and Dickson, 2015) were used for most assumptions unless indicated otherwise. Technical feasibility for grazing management practices were assessed as high( meaning there should be a low risk of failure to realise benefits). Fencing should be high technical feasibility, although because there is the possibility of landholders leaving the gate open which can be a problem it has been reduced to medium-high). For most other
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