Status and trends in wetland conservation policy under climate change in the Murray–Darling Basin, Australia

Context Australia’s Murray–Darling Basin Plan aims to manage water over-allocation and conserve the environment, while promoting sustainable water use. However, the adequacy of policy instruments and their alignment measures with the objectives of the Basin Plan for wetland conservation are debatable. Aim We explore the conservation mechanisms being implemented in the Commonwealth and three key Basin states to examine major trends in conservation policy and legislation and identify potential areas for improvement. Method A comparative analysis of conservation policies and programs was conducted to assess their effectiveness. Results We found that the implementation of wetland conservation tended to be treated as a subset of conservation for terrestrial ecosystems. Implementation programs varied markedly among the jurisdictions studied, depending on perceptions of threatening processes, wetland types and their extent, and legislative and governance frameworks. The two main pathways for implementation were strategic policy frameworks and ecohydrological measures, but clear linkages between them were lacking. Conclusion Conservation mechanisms require greater management integration to enable necessary trade-offs between consumptive and environmental uses. Although wetland conservation frameworks we examined include integrated measures to address threats to ecological processes, communities and threatened species, policies require improved target setting to enable representative conservation under climate change and alignment of policy mechanisms across scales.