Water Watch Radio

South Australia's coast has been inundated with a toxic algae bloom, killing aquatic wildlife, closing down industry and leading to calls for a national disaster status. 

In the past four months a toxic marine algae bloom has spread north through Gulf St Vincent, across Kangaroo Island, into Spencer Gulf and around Port Lincoln—and is now edging towards Adelaide’s metro beaches. Last month, it reached the North Lag...

For NAIDOC week we have a very special interview with Barkindji Malyangapa rapper who takes her name from the river, BARKAA!

Barkaa recently released a powerful new collaboration with Barkindji Malyangapa muscian from Wilcannia Leroy Johnson.

Their song Ngamaka is an ode, to mother earth, river and Country and a call to action to address the ongoing destruction of this beautiful river.  

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This week we’re excited to share a special interview we’ve been working on for a while with one of the country’s renowned artists and water activists.

Born on the banks of the Baaka river in 1947, Uncle Badger Bates is a proud Barkindji man and an inspiration to both artists and water activists alike. He’s been a strong voice for Barkindji people, fighting for their land and water rights, and he’s also...

This week on water watch we speak with Zena Cumpston, artist and co-curator of the contemporary art exhibition Ngaratya (together, us group, all in it together).

The exhibition brings together six Barkandji/Barkindji artists including Nici Cumpston, Zena Cumpston, David Doyle, Kent Morris, Adrianne Semmens and Raymond Zada. with works inspired by Barkandji/Barkindji Country, as a Mother and active participant in the project.

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Today you’re going to hear from a well read, and well written academic on water issues. Professor Quentin Grafton recently published a book, and the launch of the book was accompanied with an address to the National Press Club and an article in the Conversation. The description of the book proclaims:   

It’s high time to call out the mistruths and post truths and retell Australia...

Australia's water market is heralded as the best in the world, but it’s often a sore point for people who work the land, driving up costs and uncertainty when water is scarce. 

It’s the invisible hand, designed to move our precious blue gold, it’s highest and most productive use. 

But decades on from the market reform, who's interests is the market working in. 

This week on water water we hear from ...

This week we have a bit of arts and culture respite, but that's not to say its not going to get political!

It was our great privilege this week to interview an artist we've been following for a very long time, Murrawarri, Philipino rapper and drummer, Rhyan Claphem, who calls himself DOBBY. DOBBY has just released his debut album Warrangu, river story and it is all about the great beauty and tragedy of the Murray-Darling Basin, fro...

This week on water watch, we dip into the archive to listen back on a conversation with Richard Beasley SC, who was Senior Counsel assisting to the South Australian Royal Commission into the Murray-Darling Basin Back in 2018.

In a thorough investigation in 2018, the Royal Commission found that the Basin Plan was illegal, not just on the basis of a misreading of the Water Act but also that Murray-Darling Basin Authority had engaged ...

This week on water watch we’re heading to desert country where Kati Thanda- Lake Eyre has begun to fill as the floods of western QLD make their way through the Lake Eyre Basin. 

We hear from: 

Trevor Wright, pilot and publican at William Creek 70km West of Kati Thanda Lake Eyre and Professor Richard Kingsford river ecologist, conservation biologist and Director of Ecosystem Science at the University of NSW

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Central Australia is not usually the place we think to first for water issues, but water is life, particularly where water is scarce. This week on Water Watch we're taking you to the Arid Lands, of central Australia with Alex Vaughan the Policy and Advocacy Coordinator at the Arid Lands Environment Centre in Mparntwe Alice Springs

Watch Watch is produced by Broken Hill Community radio 2DRY. 

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This week on water watch we’re going to go back to the Plans and Progress to Restore the Darling Baaka to hear a community perspective from Darryn Clifton of the Darling River/Menindee Lakes Action Group, and hear more from Allan Raine Director, Water Planning Implementation at the NSW Department of Climate Change Energy Environment And Water and Tony Townsend Murray Darling Program Leader in Freshwater Environment for NSW DP...

In late March enormous rainfall saw devastating floods in outback Queensland. In some places more than a year’s worth of rain fell in just one-week, breaking flood records across the region. During heavy rainfall across this landscape, a network of creeks and rivers flood vast amounts of country, and in really big floods like has occurred this year, the landscape becomes an inland ocean of very powerful and fast-moving w...

This week on Water Watch we recap the fish kills in Menindee over that past 6 years, and hear from NSW Department of Climate Change Energy Environment And Water on the progress against the recommendations of the NSW Chief Scientist and Engineers Report with Director, Water Planning Implementation Allan Raine, and Murray Darling Program Leader in Freshwater Environment Tony Townsend at NSW Fisheries on the temporary fish way at Meni...

This week, in Part 3 of our multipart series on PFAS contamination in the Blue Mountains, we’re turning our attention to the organisations responsible for protecting public health. What have Australian authorities done to address PFAS contamination? Are their responses keeping pace with international research and the growing concerns of affected communities? And, perhaps most critically—are authorities being transparent...

Imagine you moved to a quiet part of the countryside, known for its beautiful blue gums, clear running waters and maybe vocal cockatoo or two, only to learn the drinking water coming for the seemingly pristine landscape around you had been contaminated with toxic chemicals for as much as 30 years. 

That’s what happened in the Blue Mountains last year, when community members tested their drinking water for “PFAS&rdq...