Murray-Darling Basin Commission: Final report

Progress against key performance indicators to 14 December 2008

The following table records progress against key performance indicators based on the Murray-Darling Basin Commission (MDBC) Strategic Plan 2005-10 and the related Business Plan. For this final MDBC report, progress is recorded up to and including 14 December 2008, after which MDBC and its functions were subsumed into the Murray-Darling Basin Authority (MDBA).

Objective 1: Protection and enhancement of the Basin's shared environmental assets and water resources

Key performance indicator	Strategy	Progress	Comments
a) Water recovery targets (as contained in The Living Murray (TLM) Business Plan) achieved totalling an average of up to 500 GL per year by June 2009	Strategy 1.1	Good	Progress has been made toward the recovery of 500 GL, with 167.7 GL long-term Cap equivalent (LTCE) listed on the Environmental Water Register at 14 December 2009, and measures to recover a further 380 GL LTCE listed on the Eligible Measures Register and being implemented. There are a number of water recovery measures nearing completion, or with components nearing completion, that are expected to be listed on the Environmental Water Register early in 2009.
b) Delivery of the agreed Environmental Works and Measures Program (EWMP) for each year of the Strategic Plan	Strategies 1.1, 1.6	Slowed	A prioritisation and rationalisation of the EWMP occurred in 2008, to bring the suite of projects being developed back in line with the available budget. The prioritisation was approved by Ministerial Council in November 2008. This prioritisation saw a number of projects dropped or reduced significantly in scope. Implementation of the prioritisation is well under way.
c) Baseline condition established, as part of the development and implementation of monitoring and evaluation arrangements for The Living Murray, for the six significant ecological assets by December 2006	Strategy 1.1	Good	Monitoring has been implemented at all icon sites to report on ecological objectives. Consistent methodologies for fish, birds and vegetation are being developed and implemented. The Icon Site Condition Report October 2008 was accepted by Ministerial Council and uploaded to the MDBC website. Fourteen targeted projects monitoring the impacts of interventions at icon sites were under way and these will further assist the establishment of the TLM baseline, noting that a trajectory approach is being used.
d) Delivery of The Living Murray First Step Decision's ecological objectives (including for floodplain and wetland health, birds and fish) at each of the six significant ecological assets from June 2009	Strategies 1.1, 1.6	Of concern	The severe drought has meant that the condition of the icon sites continues to decline and has constrained the availability of water to deliver to sites. These constraints and the decline in health require an assessment 'of concern' for this KPI. Condition and intervention monitoring programs are in place and reporting processes are being coordinated effectively. The Icon Site Condition Report October 2008 was accepted by Ministerial Council and uploaded to the MDBC website. The number and type of entitlements held on the TLM environmental portfolio has expanded to 167.7 LTCE and this will help position TLM to deliver on the environmental objectives in the future. By December 2008, only small volumes of water had been allocated against these entitlements and became available for environmental use due to the continuing drought. A volume of 1.395 GL was allocated to locations within two icon sites: Barmah-Millewa Forest, and Chowilla Floodplain and Lindsay-Wallpolla Islands. Responses to these watering actions have included increased vegetation growth at Chowilla and large numbers of turtles recorded at Barmah.
e) The Living Murray First Step evaluated on an annual basis and the development of future options considered by June 2007, consistent with the period of review for The Living Murray Business Plan (Clause 159), or earlier as requested by Ministerial Council	Strategies 1.1, 1.6	Good	The annual IAG audit of TLM for 2007-08 was conducted in October 2008. As of 14 December 2008, the report was being finalised for submission to Ministerial Council in early 2009. On 8 December 2008, the Minister for Climate Change and Water announced a review of the progress in implementing the TLM First Step decision. This was to include a review of future options for TLM.
Alternative 1 f) By June 2010, full agreement to, and compliance with, an enhanced Cap in accordance with NWI deadlines and requirements; OR Alternative 2 g) Full compliance with the Cap on surface water diversions, and finalisation of other valley caps within the Basin; AND By end 2008, full agreement to, and compliance with, integrated accounting of surface and groundwater, in accordance with NWI deadlines and requirements and considering a range of options to address the impacts of risks to water resources, which may include an enhanced Cap	Strategies 1.2, 1.4, 1.5	Good	Compliance with the Cap on surface water diversions was good (see KPI (c)).
h) Across the Basin, full compliance each year with end-of-valley salinity targets and maintenance of salinity registers in net credit, confirmed through annual audits	Strategy 1.3	Good	The 2008 Salinity Registers were confirmed in November 2008 by the Independent Audit Group for Salinity. Data on monitoring end-of-valley target sites was included in the draft annual implementation report of the Basin Salinity Management Strategy and provided to the auditors.
i) 71 EC salinity mitigation impact on target to be achieved by 2012 (61 EC by June 2010)	Strategy 1.3	Good	The BSMS Joint Works program is on track to deliver the 61 EC target by 2012. The additional 10 EC was anticipated to come from within-valley actions (including the Mallee Zone as a valley) being undertaken by the states.
j) Demonstrated reduction in costs of salt peaks by 25% by June 2010	Strategy 1.3	Good	Managing salt peaks can be achieved through both salt interception schemes (SISs) and dilution flows. Cost of salinity peaks are currently assessed through cost functions over the benchmark peak period (1975-2000 climatic sequence). The real-time peak salinity at the Basin Target Site (Morgan SA) over the last five years has been 770 EC compared to 1220 EC over the last 25 years. This reduction in peak salinity can be attributed to SISs and dilution flows, and the impact of prolonged drought.
k) Annual compliance with the Basin Salinity Target to maintain salinity levels in the River Murray at Morgan in South Australia below 800 EC for 95% of the time	Strategy 1.3	Slowed	Basin Salinity Target at Morgan, South Australia, is a long-term target to be achieved through sustained investments in salt interception schemes (SISs) and improved land and water management within the Basin. SISs and other Basin-wide salinity mitigation activities are in progress to achieve the Basin Salinity Target.
l) Annual integrated reports on the condition of, and risks to, the Basin's natural resources used in Commission and Council decision making	Strategies 1.4, 1.5, 3.4	Slowed	With the transition to MDBA and the development of the Basin Plan which will provide the proper framework for the development of an Integrated Basin Report (IBR), continued work towards the development of an IBR is no longer a priority under MDBC. Aspects of the IBR, in particular, Risks to Shared Water Resources, the Sustainable Rivers Audit (SRA) and Climate Change, continued to make assessments, collect data and report independently within their programs. The SRA Report 1 on conditions, which was launched in June 2008, has been distributed and communicated through the agreed communications strategy. The report data has also been released publicly. Under the Risks to Shared Water Resources Program, Basin states and territories have produced risk assessments of all six identified hazards to the Basin's shared water resources. The Independent Audit Group's review of these assessments is under way; however, the process has been delayed due to the application of new methods, state elections and the transition to MDBA. With the transition to MDBA, functions of the Risks to Shared Water Resources Program have been incorporated into the consideration of risks under the Basin Plan.
m) Net improvement in key native fish populations and distribution across the Basin by June 2010	Strategy 1.6	Good	The Native Fish Strategy is continuing to gain leverage from funding and work on Native Fish Demonstration Reaches, via a series of research and adoption projects looking at mitigating the impact of drought on native fish; development of a whole-of-Basin Alien Fish Plan, as well as a series of research and adoption projects targeting current knowledge gaps; and continued engagement with key stakeholders. Progress continues to be made through the construction of further fishways on the Sea to Hume Dam program funded under The Living Murray.

Objective 2: Efficient and equitable delivery of water for productive and sustainable domestic consumption, environmental benefit and economic use

Key performance indicator	Strategy	Progress	Comments
a) Delivery of state shares of available water (for domestic consumption and economic use) in 100% of instances	Strategies 2.1, 2.3	Good	State shares of available water were delivered at all times. Water resource volumes available to the three states were well below average due to low water reserves and low inflows. There were no system constraints during the period 1 June 2008 to 14 December 2008 inclusive that prevented full delivery of available water to the states.
b) Demonstrated track record in each year of responding to environmental watering opportunities, consistent with the Basin Environmental Watering Plan and the outcomes of the six Significant Ecological Assets Plans	Strategy 1.1 TLM also contributes to Objective 2.	Good	By December 2008, 1.395 GL of water was allocated to two icon sites in accordance with the agreed management objectives consistent with extreme drought, namely: to avoid critical loss of species, communities and ecosystems maintain key refuges avoid irretrievable damage or catastrophic events.
c) Full compliance with Cap, confirmed through annual audits	Strategy 1.2 Management of the Cap also contributes to Objective 2.	Good	The independent audit of the Cap for 2007-08 was conducted and the audit report was on track for release in March 2009. The audit showed that, except for the combined Barwon-Darling - Lower Darling valley, in all valleys where a Cap applies, diversions were within Cap. The Cap for the Queensland Border Rivers was finalised. Significant progress was made in accrediting the Cap models (the tools for assessing compliance with the Cap): out of 18 models requiring approval, eight have been approved and seven are being audited. The Water Audit Monitoring (WAM) Report for 2007-08 has been published. A report on environmental water giving details for environmental water allocation, use and Cap adjustments was published for the first time in the WAM Report.
d) Improved measurement of shared water resources across the Basin, as required by the National Water Initiative (NWI)	Strategies 1.2, 2.1, 2.4	Good	Two projects - an on-ground monitoring project and a remote sensing one - were under way to develop a method for estimating land surface diversions. Significant progress was made. Models were developed to estimate land surface diversions using on-ground measurements and remotely sensed data. Significant rainfall and land surface diversions events were awaited to test the models.
e) NWI directions on barrier-free market arrangements for open, interstate water trade across the southern connected Basin achieved, as required by NWI	Strategy 2.2	Good	Since 1 July 2007, all entitlements and allocations traded between the states have been in accordance with Schedule D of the Murray-Darling Basin Agreement and its supporting protocols which provide for: tagged entitlement transfers between New South Wales (NSW), Victoria (VIC) and South Australia (SA) exchange rate entitlement transfers between VIC and SA for agreed transfers into specified river systems allocation transfers between NSW, VIC and SA. In consultation with contracting governments, a review of Schedule D protocols is in progress to ensure that they are legally consistent and able to operate under the Water Act 2007 (Cwlth). This reduces potential impediments to the water market in the southern connected Murray-Darling Basin. In 2008-09 the predominant interstate water trading mechanism used was allocation transfers, with SA and VIC being net importers while NSW was a net exporter of water. The highest ever volume of interstate allocation transfers occurred this year for the period to December 2008, superseding transfer volumes in 2007-08 which were the previous highest volumes transferred.
f) Be within the top one-third of water asset managers in Australia by June 2010	Strategies 2.1, 2.3 BSMS also contributes to Objective 2	Good	Following the Benchmarking Reports received in December 2007, which indicated MDBC asset management was about the top one-third mark, two annual inspections have been undertaken by the Executive Director River Murray and General Manager Assets. These inspections have indicated ongoing improvement in the overall condition of assets and asset management practices.
g) For large dams, measurable improvement each year until 100% compliant with Australian National Committee on Large Dams (ANCOLD) Guidelines	Strategy 2.3	Good	Progress continues to be made on six major dam safety projects at Hume Dam (3 projects), Dartmouth Dam (1 project) and Lake Victoria Storage (2 projects).

Objective 3: Delivery of high-quality advice to council, and achievement of its endorsed priorities, through strengthened capacity of the commission and the commission office

Key performance indicator	Strategy	Progress	Comments
a) Ministerial Council satisfied with quality and timeliness of advice, that decisions have been implemented effectively and that its Community Advisory Committee has been provided with appropriate information and has been well supported (all measured annually)	Strategies 3.2, 3.3, 3.6	Good	In September 2008 a survey of key stakeholders was undertaken to determine the level of satisfaction with MDBC's services. Overall, taking into account the quantitative findings and answers to the open ended questions, the picture that emerged was one of a well-performing organisation in providing support and services to its various stakeholders. Satisfaction ratings of 7 and above on a scale of 0-10 were consistently scored.
b) Commissioners' satisfaction with commission office's secretariat services, budget development, and management and performance reporting, to reach 9/10 by 2007	Strategies 3.1, 3.6	Good	The Secretariat continues to perform well in all areas assessed. An effectiveness rating of 7 was received for the development of budgets, which suggests a high level of satisfaction among the Commissioners and Deputy Commissioners. However, developing and managing budgets was highlighted as an area that could be targeted for improvement.
c) Revised governance and committee structure in place	Strategies 3.1, 3.3	Good	Strong governance and committee structures were maintained by MDBC up until transition of functions to MDBA on 15 December. A major focus was ensuring a smooth transition of operations to MDBA.
d) Staff satisfaction survey improvement year on year	Strategy 3.2	Slowed	The survey was not conducted in 2008 -2009 due to the impending transition of functions to MDBA.
e) Zero long-term injury frequency rate in each year	Strategy 3.2	Good	MDBC continued to focus on employees' early return to work from illness or injury. No long-term cases were on hand on transition of functions to MDBA. MDBC's Occupational Health and Safety (OH&S) Committee continued to oversee OH&S issues in the workplace.