Land use

Western Australia is the largest Australian State, spanning 2 400 kilometres from north to south, and experiencing a variety of climatic conditions, soil and land properties, and water availability. Accordingly, the state is suited to a variety of agricultural industries ranging from open range grazing and broadacre cereal cropping through to irrigated pastures and horticulture, orchards and vineyards.

The Department of Agriculture and Food, Western Australia provides the advice, support and tools needed to ensure the State’s land has the capability to sustain agricultural use, without degrading the soil and water resources on which it relies, and to ensure our most valuable agricultural land is protected from non-agricultural development. 

Articles

  • Managing saline dryland (rainfed, not irrigated) can provide many benefits: increased whole-farm productivity, reduced on-farm and off-farm degradation, and protection of landscape and community va

  • Dryland salinity (salinity on non-irrigated land) is one of the greatest environmental threats facing Western Australia's agricultural land, water, biodiversity and infrastructure.

  • More than 1 million hectares of previously productive land in South West Western Australia (SW WA) is severely affected by dryland salinity, and about 0.75 million hectares is moderately affected..

  • Dryland salinity can be assessed on-farm by observation and/or measurement.

  • Salt is a natural component of land, water and ecological systems in Western Australia. Large areas of naturally saline land (primary salinity) were present before European settlement.

  • The Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development (DPIRD) is planning for the future of irrigated agriculture development in the Pilbara