What are the management strategies for preventing dryland salinity? Summary of the current state of the sciences

摘要: Dryland salinity is one of Australia’s most serious environmental and resource management issues; and scientists, land managers, and governments are still coming to terms with the magnitude of the salinity problem and the strategies needed to manage it. The National Land and Water Resources Audit (NLWRA, 2001) concluded that about 5.7 million ha are at risk or affected by dryland salinity and that this could increase to over 17 million ha in the next 50 years. In the Murray-Darling Basin, more than 7 million ha of grazing and cropping country are under threat. Increasing salinity of our river systems inevitably follows dryland salinisation as groundwater flows into the streams and salt washes from the surface of saline soil. Salinity trends in our rivers are of major concern, with a number of rivers in Western Australia already too salty for human consumption. The Murray-Darling River system is salinising at an …