New dam for farmers' safety net
Work is complete on WA's new 10 megalitre dam.
Farmers in the Great Southern will be able to access new supplies for emergency feeding water during dry seasons.
The dam is located at Jacup, 31 kilometres east of Jerramungup, and is designed specifically to provide non-drinking emergency water supplies for around 55 local farmers.
The dam is set up to pump water to a large storage tank, greatly reducing the distance farmers have to cart their supplies.
Jerramungup Shire CEO Bill Parker has told the ABC that dam will be of great use in bushfire response.
“The Jacup area is in close proximity to the Fitzgerald National Park and we've had a lot of fire in there in the past and this allows the fire brigades to put extra water in their tanks ahead of the fire season,” he said.
“People in the Jacup area previously had to go into Jerramungup which is [a] fair number of kilometres away to get water for emergency stock purposes and this now allows them to access water locally and isn't such a burden during those dry periods.”