Recently, some changes have occurred to the eligibility criteria for Irrigation Incentives in the Macalister Irrigation Area.
BPSI (Best Practice Surface Irrigation) is now available ($400/ha) for anyone that is able to irrigate with a stable and consistent flow rate. This now allows river and groundwater diverters to be eligible as well as those with a modernised outlet. The only exceptions are solely drainage diverters, or those irrigators with Dethridge wheels.
Other Eligibility criteria
- A Reuse dam must be present
- Have a completed and approved farm plan that has the proposed works on it
- Work must have not already been completed (i.e we can’t offer retrospective payments)
Flood to Spray conversion incentive is now available for areas that have previously been funded for a reuse dam, but have not claimed the BPSI incentive at $400/ha, so long as the reuse was installed before 1st July 2019.
To be eligible for this incentive, you must have a completed & approved farm plan that has a detailed design for the pivot on it, and there needs to be evidence of flood irrigation occurring on the area in the past.
Our other incentives are still available including:
Reuse system funding at $400/ha, providing that the design is on the farm plan, and it is built to these specifications:
- It needs to be sized between 0.75-1ML/10 hectares of irrigated catchment
- The area that the dam can re-apply water to needs to be 40% of the total irrigated catchment area of the reuse dam.
Irrigation Farm Planning incentives, rate dependant on whether the farm plan is a new farm plan ($90/ha) or an upgraded farm plan ($45/ha). We will fund up to 75% of the plan cost
If you are unsure of your eligibility of these incentives, or have a general irrigation inquiry, feel free to call the Gippsland irrigation team on 03 5147 8000 and we can provide you with more information.
The red line above represents the current incentives boundary, however irrigators outside this boundary are still encouraged to contact us.
