Commonwealth Consolidated Acts Commonwealth Consolidated Acts(1) The purposes of the environmental watering plan are:
(a) to safeguard existing environmental water; and
(b) to plan for the recovery of additional environmental water; and
(c) to coordinate the management of:
(i) existing environmental water; and
(ii) the additional environmental water that is recovered;
(d) protect and restore the wetlands and other environmental assets of the Murray - Darling Basin; and
(e) protect biodiversity dependent on the Basin water resources and achieve other environmental outcomes for the Murray - Darling Basin.
(2) The environmental watering plan must specify:
(a) the overall environmental objectives for the water - dependent ecosystems of the Murray - Darling Basin; and
(b) targets by which to measure progress towards achieving the environmental objectives specified in accordance with paragraph (a); and
(c) an environmental management framework for planned environmental water and held environmental water; and
(d) the methods to be used to identify environmental assets in the Murray - Darling Basin that will require environmental watering; and
(e) the principles to be applied, and methods to be used, to determine the priorities for applying environmental water (including applying that water to environmental assets that are identified using the methods specified under paragraph (d)); and
(f) the principles to be applied in environmental watering.
(3) Without limiting paragraph (2)(b), the environmental watering plan may specify targets for one or more of the following:
(a) water resource health;
The targets may relate to the Basin water resources as a whole or to particular Basin water resources.
(4) In preparing the environmental watering plan, the Authority
must have regard to any other programs for water recovery and
environmental watering in the Murray - Darling Basin.