Without sacrificing either yield or quality, Orlando Wyndham is reporting initial water savings around 33% compared to historical usage figures from its partnership with the South Australian Research and Development Institute in a project aimed to save billions of litres of River Murray water annually. Being trialled on around 10% of the company’s Langhorne Creek vineyard of 630 ha, the project deploys sub-surface irrigation in conjunction with partial root zone drying and mulching. Currently estimated around 500 billion litres, the water usage of the Australian grape growing industry could therefore produce water savings of around 150 billion litres each year. Are the rice and cotton industries able to lower their water consumption rates to match?
