Paper long abstract:

This paper is concerned with the political economy and the different sub-cultural perspectives that lead to conflicts between recreational water users and farming communities in Queensland. Drawing on recent ethnographic studies of the Mitchell and Brisbane River catchment areas, it observes that in the last two decades, farming has declined as a central aspect of the state and national economy, while tourism has boomed. Within the same landscape, the aims and aspirations of farming and recreational water users are often diametrically opposed. Farmers are anxious to protect (and if they can increase) their water allocations, while tourists and tourist industries tend to support the efforts of environmental groups to persuade governments to cut allocations for irrigation and enforce more draconian regulations with respect to water management and the maintenance of 'environmental flows'. Farmers and recreational water users not only have opposing ideas about what constitutes positive developmental directions, but also widely differing interactions with water, which in themselves serve to inculcate values that may be irreconcilable.