Nick Xenophon (SA, Independent) Share this | Hansard source

I am grateful for the minister's response but it does not deal with the specific question. These amendments are to uphold the principle that we should be improving water availability and food security in this country. The minister has acknowledged that it does take into account environmental issues as per NRM plans. Natural resource management plans and regional natural resource management plans that we see throughout the country are usually administered at a state and local government level. The concern I have is that those plans do not necessarily deal with food security or improving water availability.

I do not want to labour the point but the nub of the question is this: if a project can be shown to have a beneficial aspect in terms of water security and/or food security and, all things being equal, compared to another project that does not have the same benefits in terms of either water or food security and it still complies with the issue of taking carbon out of the atmosphere, to what extent does a project that is more beneficial for water and food security get preference over a project that does not do that but is equal in all other respects in terms of sequestering carbon?