Evaluation of National Water Account 2010

The National Water Account 2010 is the first in an annual series.

An evaluation process will follow the release of the 2010 Account. The Bureau will continue to seek comment from a wide range of potential users of the product, in order to tailor and enhance its value to water managers and policy makers and to improve the utility of future National Water Accounts.

The outcomes of the evaluation will inform the preparation of the National Water Account 2011 and beyond. Three key areas of focus are:

1. user and stakeholder feedback on the National Water Account 2010
2. streamlining the National Water Account preparation and publication process
3. refining technical methods and identifying priority data and knowledge gaps

In parallel with the preparation of the 2010 Account, the Bureau is developing a suite of information technology tools designed to streamline information gathering, processing, reviewing and publication. A focus of the evaluation will be on opportunities to further improve the overall production process, reducing the logistical implications of the task, strengthening project management and ensuring timely and effective communication between the many contributors.

The development and refinement of technical methods used to prepare data inputs is also a priority. The adequacy of the quantification methods used will be assessed and priority data and knowledge gaps will be identified. Emerging technical issues will also be identified, in light of the evolving scope of information presented in the National Water Account.

Preparation of National Water Account 2011

Preparation of the next National Water Account will commence in mid-2011. It will cover the 2010–11 reporting year, using 2009–10 as a comparison year.

The reporting regions will be selected considering their national significance and the capacity of the Bureau and its reporting partners to prepare reports.

Future development

As the annual series of National Water Accounts develops, there are opportunities to enrich the way in which the body of information is presented to the user. For example, inter-annual comparison of accounts will be possible, highlighting how water management of a region changes over time. There are also opportunities to develop summary statistics and indices which provide a high level snapshot about key information contained in each set of water accounting reports.