The Northern Territory government’s decision to grant its biggest ever water licence to a private business is an “extraordinary” giveaway of a public asset worth up to $300m for employment benefits that are “largely illusory”, a new report commissioned by the Central Land Council claims.
Last year the NT government granted Fortune Agribusiness a free 30-year licence to extract up to 40,000 megalitres of groundwater a year from aquifers under Singleton station, near Tennant Creek. The NT does not currently have a water pricing regime and does not charge developers for water.
