A researcher has called for local government to start to adapt to practices and try to adopt practices to help farmers prepare for drought, rather than it being reactionary.
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La Trobe University climate change adaptation chair, Lauren Rickards made the claim at a Bendigo forum about drought preparedness organised by the Victoria Drought Resilience Adoption and Innovation Hub
"Looking across the research, and one of the things that comes out of that is the importance of helping out enablers to adapt, and local government is a key enabler, so are universities, and a whole number of community organisations," Prof Rickards said.
"Really focusing in on [those organisation's] own adaptation is a crucial thing,
"Often [local government] are in the role of assisting others, and often spoken about in assisting roles like disaster recovery and disaster response"
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Prof Rickards was a contributing author to the most recent report released by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which identified local governments in Australia and New Zealand are experiencing 'institutional overwhelm'.
"This is when you know very well what climate change entails, that drought is around the corner, and you know what you should be doing," Prof Rickards said.
"But you are dealing with yesterday's issues and all its compounding effects."
She also said that local governments have a role to keep connected to those who work in their rural areas, and collaborate with other councils and organisations.
"That's about all the sorts of regional based partnerships and connections... but also thinking about connecting along much greater spatial reaches as well," she said.
"In the capital cities, there is a huge amount of focus on city-to-city when it comes to climate change, mitigation and adaptation,
"We don't see that so much in local councils in rural and regional areas, but there is no reason why we couldn't have rural councils connecting,"
City of Greater Bendigo manager of climate change and environment Michelle Wyatt also spoke at the forum and said there were many initiatives being undertaken in association with other councils.
"Something that is important to be aware of is that council's response to a changing climate is something that really impacts all of the organisation," Ms Wyatt said.
"Some of the things we are doing... [include] working with our farming community to help them be more adaptive... and work together with other councils and decided to work collaboratively to reach more farmers,"
Ms Wyatt said it was important for the City of Greater Bendigo to take accountability for how it keeps sustainable too both presently and into the future.
"We just did a climate risk assessment for our own organisation, which looked at [City of Bendigo's] operations and what we need to do between now and 2030 and between now and 2050 to respond to scenarios that have been modelled," she said.
"We believe we are doing a good job now, but how's that going to change when we have more extreme weather, more disasters, drier weather?
"Are our current processes and practices going to look different in 2030 or 2050?"
She said collaborations with Deakin University on land capability assessment for the region, which looked at how local farming may change in the future in times of drought, would help in finding the answers to those questions.
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