People of the River
Anthropologist W.E.H Stanner observed in The Daly River Tribes, how “Ritual obligations were laid down by their Dreamtime ancestors which ensured that the land around the Daly would yield the products needed to sustain life.”[10] Three decades later, in 1968, Stanner’s famous Boyer lectures on ABC Radio, After the Dreaming, defined Australian race relations and consequences as, “a cult of forgetfulness practised on a national scale”. Stanner’s lectures on Australian colonial invasions insisted that frontier violence and the contest for resources are central to our settler history.

After the introduction of the Aboriginal Land Rights (Northern Territory) Act 1976, some traditional custodians took up pastoral leases. Historian Peter Forrest updated Stanner’s observations in The Spirit of the Daly (1989), describing a reasonal semblance of co-operation on the river: “Aboriginal people, floodplain graziers and small irrigators have worked together to keep the river and the wetlands alive”. Since 2019 however, industrial farming has vastly accelerated the damage and depletion of water resources, ecosystems and biodiversity, and sharpens ongoing Indigenous trauma and dislocation and the ability to pass on knowledge: the latest twist in this river story.

Dirty Cotton: And the River Ran Dry
The Northern Myth began with Federation and continues today. In the 1960s agricultural economist Bruce Davidson described the Northern Myth as a misplaced belief in the north’s capacity to accommodate vastly expanded agriculture and irrigation. Central to the Northern Myth claim, then and now, is that water is “wasted” without more economic development.

Lobbying continued behind closed doors. In 2015 the Commonwealth government released the latest White Paper on Developing Northern Australia which called for significant expansion of irrigation. Notably, the plan failed to incorporate environmental water reserves, known as the 80/20 principle, or that 80% is for environment and public good. This is the Water Allocation Planning Framework, with two separate zones in the Territory, Top End and Arid Zone (largely to supply Alice Springs with water). Top End rules (covering the wild rivers) are 80/20. In the Arid zone the reverse applies. These rules are the basis of establishing an “estimated sustainable yield”. Running out of water? Move the arid zone up north to serve private (as opposed to public) interest.

In 2018 the NT government lifted the ban on cotton, with first harvest on the Daly River occurring a year later. Many of the players connected to the collapse of the Darling River system now lead the northern cotton gold rush. Upriver from little Nauiyu, big players—such as Tipperary and Claravale stations—have cleared endangered Savannah ecosystems and tripled water allocation from already over-allocated aquifers. They now want further subsidy for a cotton gin. This is the “modern cotton” narrative.

In the NT, major water licenses are “free” and upscaling water allocations is a smooth and opaque process. There is almost no monitoring. Most aquifers don’t have management plans and, as cotton is heavily reliant on chemicals (nitrogen fertilizer and herbicides), it is unlikely there will be monitoring of contamination.[11] Growers hustle for water from the river and over-allocated aquifers upstream near Katherine. Proposed changes to pastoral lease legislation will potentially allow 45% of land-mass to be cotton plantations. About 25 stations have indicated interest in the cotton bonanza.[12]

In 2022, the government adopted “burn the Amazon” regulations and relaxed approval times for land clearing permits from six months to six weeks. Thousands of hectares of bushland were bulldozed without permission knowing approval would be retrospective.[13] However, a recent Tree Ring climate study by UNSW scientists told of a much drier past over 600 years, arguing, “Climate models suggest monsoon rain, the life-blood of the river system, will become more variable”.[14] Meanwhile, a recent Australia Institute report questioned the economic benefits of cotton to the Territory.[15]

The Murray-Darling Basin Royal Commission Report (2019) offers a scathing assessment of many governmental decisions and processes that led to the disaster. The report found the management and board of the Murray-Darling Basin Authority had acted negligently and unlawfully. The South Australian Report was ignored.16 Indigenous water justice is even more elusive. Traditional ownership of land (Native Title) was only recognised by the Australian High Court in 1992, overturning the mythic doctrine of Terra Nullius. Unhappily, Native Title legal rights to water remains almost non-existent (Aqua Nullius), comprising less than 0.01% of water entitlements.

There is a bigger picture. The Daly’s wild partner is the Roper River. The pair define the ‘Big Rivers region’ and form the Katherine-Daly-Roper system. The Roper River’s surface water catchments cover most of the Beetaloo region and groundwater discharge supports perennial flows in the Roper, Flora and Daly Rivers, plus streams and springs in the Elsey National Park and spectacular Nitmiluk Gorge near Katherine—all major tourist destinations.

In May 2023, the NT government green-lit fracking in the Beetaloo Basin (subject to investigating lacuna highlighted in the Pepper Inquiry)[17], claiming that “environmental risks could be safely managed”. A broad range of voices has swiftly challenged “safe management” claims and condemned the government’s final call on fracking in the Beetaloo.

Despite our abundance of renewable resources, political focus still facilitates unsustainable, extractive cotton and gas industries in the north. They call it a “post-Covid reconstruction plan”. But the turtles and aquifer stygofauna will not appreciate the ironic deceit. In response, these art works plead for Indigenous rights and knowledge to be recognized and included in economic and political decision-making. People of the river: a voice to be heard and a central place at the table.

— Jo Holder    
    Director, The Cross Art Project