The south-west Victoria and south-east SA and south-west WA regions exhibit the most favourable prospects for tree planting to address land and water salinity across large parts of the landscape and capture non-salinity benefits including wood production, according to a report on “Integrated Forestry on Farmland” by Cooperative Research Centre for Plant Based Management of Dryland Salinity, 2007.
Favourable for supporting forestry industry: While potential existed for adverse impacts on water yield, these could be mitigated to some extent by well-targeted planting and species selection. The size of forestry industries in and near these regions was already substantial, with well-developed products, species options and supporting infrastructure.
Hunter, northern and central west NSW less favourable: Extending these industries within the 600–750 mm rainfall environment presented fewer obstacles than in regions without the same forest industries base, as in the case of Hunter NSW, northern NSW and central-west NSW.
Need to incentivise uptake of plantations: However, in most cases there would still be a need for incentives to achieve extensive uptake and plantings would need to satisfy existing and potential planning controls, including water resource restrictions on plantation development in the case of SA.
Reference: Report on “Integrated Forestry on Farmland”, by Lisa Robins and Nico Marcar, CRC for Plant-based Management of Dryland Salinity, 2007
Erisk Net, 2007, p. 24