A tense wait for clues on the new Murray-Darling Basin regime has been made excruciating for farmers, with rumours flying of huge cuts to water entitlements and figures that won't be released.
The Murray-Darling Basin Authority on Friday will release a guide to its coming plan, which will lay out a new way to manage water in the food bowl that better balances environmental and irrigation needs.
The number every irrigator is waiting on is their Sustainable Diversion Limit (SDL) - the maximum amount of water that can be extracted from around 100 water sources in the basin.
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On the eve of the guide's release, farmers were reeling from reports the limits would cut their allocations of between 27 and 37 per cent.
Government wouldn't confirm
Neither the authority, which is independent from government, nor Water Minister Tony Burke would confirm the leaks.
It is rumoured that rather than releasing a draft limit for each catchment area, the range will be the only figure released, and will apply to the entire basin.
Mr Burke, who on Thursday flew over the now-flowing River Murray mouth, said it was important to keep in mind the guide wasn't final.
"The important thing for people to remember is, whatever comes out at four o'clock on Friday kicks off a new round of consultation and people who think that the authority might have got the figures wrong, should engage," he told ABC Radio.
National Irrigators Council chief Danny O'Brien said a basin-wide "range" would do little to enlighten irrigators.
After 18 months and three delays, they deserved better, he said.
"If we find that in the guide there's no information on a valley by valley basis, that will only compound the problem and make this whole process a complete farce," Mr O'Brien told AAP.
Big cuts could 'devastate'
The National Farmers Federation chief Ben Fargher said cuts of up to 37 per cent would devastate communities, and could mean 20,000 job losses in NSW alone.
He too was angered by the leaks.
"This doesn't inspire confidence and engagement in the process," he said.
The federation wants a full rationale for the water caps including the authority's modelling and the assumptions underpinning it, and the economic costs on regional communities.
The Australian Conservation Foundation's Dr Arlene Harriss-Buchan said the government must support communities to start more sustainable industries.
"In the future, there may be less irrigation-dependent jobs in the basin but there are enormous opportunities for much more secure jobs in other industries," she said.
Dr Harriss-Buchan stressed a cut in irrigated water did not mean the equivalent cut in agricultural production, and that an unhealthy river would result in lost productivity.
The loss of the dairy industry in the lower lakes was proof.
"Unhealthy rivers give us nothing but salinity and blue-green algae infestations," she said.
A report by consultants Judith Stubbs and Associates estimated that a 25 per cent cut in water to irrigators would cost Australia $1.4 billion a year and 14,000 jobs.
