A lucrative industry has emerged on the doorstep of the Northern Territory — around five years after a ban was lifted. And it is about to double in size.
As the annual monsoon fast approaches, farmers are preparing massive swathes of land across the Top End for one of the world's most profitable crops: cotton.
In the middle of 2019, Bruce Connolly was at the helm of harvesting the Territory's first commercial cotton trial in 15 years at Tipperary Station, south of Darwin.
That year, just over 50 hectares were picked and baled.
Since then, as southern drought-plagued cotton regions faced increased scrutiny, many in the industry have looked for other regions to grow in, and they have chosen the Northern Territory, a jurisdiction where water is free, there is abundant land, and the climate is just right.
This year, as the planting window opens, the cotton industry is expected to expand from around 8,000 hectares to around 15,000 hectares, along a wide belt of country that stretches about 100km south of Katherine, through the Douglas Daly region, and north to Adelaide River.
'An exceptionally good year'
It follows the successful 2022 harvest, where some bales fetched more than $900, according to the manager of Tipperary Station and Northern Cotton Growers Association president, Bruce Connolly.
"I'm not sure we've seen it that high too many times before," he said, with prices traditionally sitting at the $500 to $600 mark.
So, is there a better crop to be planting in northern Australia right now on a broadacre scale?
Not according to Mr Connolly.
"[It's a] very, very high return crop," he said.
The industry as a whole produced yields of around two to seven bales of cotton per hectare, depending on location, using a mostly "rain-fed" system, which relies not on irrigation, but on monsoon downpours, Mr Connolly said.
In past years, southern growers have averaged between 10 and 15 bales per hectare, using an irrigation system.
"We did struggle as you move further south where rainfall was very patchy … but anywhere north of Katherine we had an exceptionally good year," NT Farmers Association chief executive Paul Burke said.
Making the most of the monsoon
Since the crop's popularity started rising in northern Australia, cotton has had some sections of the community worried about the steady supply of water crucial to production, and how land clearing could impact the climate, sacred sites, and endangered animals.
Last month, environmental groups slammed the NT government's draft water allocation plan for the Georgina Wiso Basin covering the Beetaloo, Roper, and Douglas Daly regions.
It indicated up to 262 gigalitres of water — the equivalent of more than 100,000 Olympic swimming pools — could be taken sustainably each year, of which about three-quarters would go towards industries, including agriculture and mining.
It catalysed a joint letter from water experts from universities across the country expressing concerns about the government's "poor" water regulations.
The industry has repeatedly claimed that comparisons to the Murray-Darling Basin are misleading, and that strong regulation is the key to managing the industry sustainably.
On top of that, Mr Burke said initial indications that the industry would consist of 80 per cent rain-fed crops, and 20 per cent irrigated, had been reassessed.
"It's probably more realistic that it's sitting at 90-95 per cent rain-fed [and] 5 per cent irrigated, but we think, in time, people will start to migrate to a rain-fed model with a small supplementary irrigated crop sitting beside it," Mr Burke said.
"We don't think that cotton is going to be the massive water user that people talk about."
And he said changes in the climate could work in the industry's favour.
"The cotton crop likes the heat. It likes the sunshine, it likes the rain. And all of the modelling that I've seen in relation to cotton, in relation to climate change, says that north Australia will potentially be hotter and wetter," he said.
Worries for workers protecting the land
Matty Shields, a Malak Malak traditional owner in the Nauiyu region, was a ranger, and now works for the Northern Land Council.
He knows the country around the Douglas Daly like the back of his hand, and over the past couple of years has grown increasingly worried about the industry encroaching on his country.
"We've always been left in the dark, us traditional owners," he said.
He said it was "upsetting" that hunting places frequented by older generations were slowly disappearing, as agriculture spread, and was worried about chemicals leaching into the river system, and cotton plants growing on the side of the road.
"We've seen cotton along the side of the road and we've been pulling out plants," he said.
"We're worried our country will be destroyed."
