What are Sustainable Water Strategies?
Sustainable Water Strategies (SWS) secure a region’s long-term water supply. They are used to identify threats to water availability and water quality, and include policies and actions to help water users, water corporations and catchment management authorities (CMAs) manage and respond to those threats.
Existing sustainable water strategies
There are three regional sustainable water strategies for Victoria
- Central and Gippsland Region Sustainable Water Strategy - 2022
- Northern Region Sustainable Water Strategy - 2009
- Western Region Sustainable Water Strategy - 2011
Implementing sustainable water strategies
The Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning (DELWP) leads the implementation of sustainable water strategies in partnership with the water sector, Traditional Owners and the community. DELWP undertakes annual monitoring and reporting on the implementation of SWS actions.Please visit each SWS tab for more information about the action status for each individual SWS.
Reviewing sustainable water strategies
The Water Act 1989 requires Sustainable Water Strategies to be reviewed after 10 years. Reviews provide an opportunity to identify if the timelines and targets of the Strategy have been met.
Water for Victoria identified the opportunity to complete five-yearly assessments of Sustainable Water Strategies. The five-yearly assessments help identify any key trends and issues to be taken up in any future review.
Please visit each SWS tab for more information about the review and assessments and to download the reports.
Next steps
The three regional sustainable water strategies are current and remain current until future strategies are developed in the regions. Annual monitoring and reporting on the implementation of the SWSs actions will continue.
The strategies
Contact us
Do you have questions or want to learn more about these strategies? Please contact us below:
Sustainable Water Strategy team
sws.team@delwp.vic.gov.au
Page last updated: 05/09/22