The Fitzroy Basin, the largest catchment draining to the Great Barrier Reef, has experienced increasing pressure from competing water demands, climate variability, and evolving policy and environmental requirements. While water planning frameworks aim to balance economic, environmental, social, and cultural outcomes, a key gap has been the limited integration of socio-economic drivers into catchment-scale water management decisions.
A comprehensive socio-economic assessment was undertaken to support the review of the Fitzroy Basin Water Plan by directly addressing this gap through integrating socio-economic analysis into catchment-scale decision-making. The approach combined demographic and economic analysis, sectoral water use assessment, stakeholder engagement, and spatial analysis using GIS. The study also evaluated water markets, unallocated water reserves, and infrastructure and development pressures across subcatchments, supported by interactive data visualisation.
The analysis identified strong dependence on water across agriculture, mining, and regional communities, alongside significant cultural and environmental values, particularly for First Nations peoples and downstream ecosystems connected to the Great Barrier Reef. Key findings included substantial underutilisation of water allocations, increasing demand from large-scale projects, climate-driven variability in water availability, and growing pressure on groundwater and ecological systems. Outputs included regional socio-economic profiles, spatial datasets, decision-support tools linking water use to catchment pressures, and priority areas for reform.
The work demonstrated that integrating socio-economic analysis into water planning improves alignment between water allocation, infrastructure development, and catchment outcomes. As part of a broader program across eight Queensland water plans, the approach provides a transferable model for improving river and catchment management in complex, multi-user systems.