Promoting Salinity Solutions through Agribusiness

The acknowledged cause of dryland salinity is the upward movement of groundwater tables resulting from changes in landuse across the Australian continent. Before European settlement the ecosystem was in equalibrium; water use by the native vegetation covering the landscape was relatively equal to the seasonal rainfall. This resulted in little 'leakage' through the soil profile. The imposition of a European farming system, which consisted predominantly of annual crops, into the Australian environment has resulted in increased 'leakage' through to the water table and rising groundwater. The rising water table mobilises salts within the soil and sometimes the water carrying the mobilsed salt meets the surface expressing itself as dryland salinity.

One of the primary aims of this joint project is to promote agricultural systems that use all the available rainfall as it occurs to reduce leakage. However, in order to make best practice decisions about how to plan your whole farm system to do this you need to have access to the latest meteorological information regarding mid to long range weather forecasting. While no system for forecasting weather is perfect, it is possible to gain some understanding of the likelihood of forthcoming weather events likely to have an effect on forward planning.

There are range of websites that provide information about weather forecasts. The Australian Bureau of Meteorology (BoM) site is a quite comprehensive and excellent site however, this feature can sometimes be to its detriment, as it is sometimes difficult to navigate to the information you are seeking.

On this page we have provided links that will take you directly to information within the sites that relate specifically to mid/long range forecasts, the SOI and the El Nino/La Nina weather pattern.

Australian Bureau of Meteorology (BOM).
The BoM 4 day forecast is at
http://www.bom.gov.au/products/IDG00074.shtml
Notes: The hatching lines indicate where there is a chance of rain, not necessarily an expectation. This information provides a useful first cut. If this page shows some indication of rain, it is worth investigating the other pages outlined here however, if there is nothing indicated here then you can be sure there will be nothing.

Seasonal length "outlook".
http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/ahead/rain_ahead.shtml
Notes: This page provides the national seasonal rainfall outlook. State based versions of the outlook are also available via this page however, they rarely say more than is in the main outlook.

The "El Nino wrap up" is an excellent summary of the El Nino situation with some comment on likely influence on rainfall.
http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/enso/

The Bureau POAMA sea surface temperature forecast model is currently the best in the world and you can access daily output from
http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/coupled_model/poama.shtml
The Nino 3 and Nino 4 zones of the Pacific are where El Ninos develop that affect Australian weather patterns.

The Weather Company
The Weather Company computer model outputs via a site called Weatherzone
http://www.weatherzone.com.au/
Notes: This site allows you to access weather forecasts for your individual area. You can input your nearest town (or Postcode) in a box on the upper left section to receive a brief descriptive forecast for the next few days. In addition, you are also able to access Weather Maps/Synoptic maps, further down the left side to access 6 days of output from the computer models used here.

A useful strategy is to compare the information provided here with the US IGES information. If both sets of information are similar the confidence in the output is high, however be wary of the information if they differ significantly.