The plan has directed strategic investments across the irrigated landscape of the Goulburn-Broken catchment since its inception.
Mr O’Kane oversaw the implementation of the plan during his 13 years at the helm of Goulburn Broken CMA and is candid about its achievements and where it fell short.
He said the plan was created to manage the rising watertable and salinity.
“We had a real problem in the fruit industry in the ‘70s with trees dying due to rising watertables,” Mr O’Kane said.
“Groundwater was rising, productivity was under threat and things were looking pretty grim after a heap of wet years.
“We knew there had to be a greater focus on irrigation water efficiency and a smarter approach to land management.”
Reflecting on three decades years of the plan, Mr O’Kane said he was proud to have been involved.
“The community supported it and the departments worked together successfully. I had never seen that happen before,” he said.
“There were bitter feuds between agencies when we started but Joan Kirner (Victorian Premier from 1990 to 1992) and the government put a stop to all that nonsense by empowering the community.”
He said the plan’s greatest strength was its commitment to good science.
“Having that rigour right from the start was key to its success.”
Mr O’Kane said that by its nature the plan was flexible.
“For example, we had to adapt when there was a blue-green algae problem and we worked hard to address that … mind you the drought pretty much fixed that problem for us.
“That flexibility continues now with environmental flows. We’re still trying to work out how to minimise damage to the river and achieve what we need downstream.”
Given his time again Mr O’Kane said he’d push for a greater focus on equilibrium.
“We needed to do more work around how far you could push the system without breaking it. We should have introduced the resilience concept earlier.
“Having said that, the plan has achieved plenty.
“Some of those things have happened because of the plan and some in spite of the plan but overall the outcome has been pretty good from an environmental perspective.”
