SHV Chart, page-94

You're right about the MIS. Although Select wasn't itself an MIS, I thought that it had bought the almond properties of Great Southern. I'm still not sure that it didn't.
As to expansion outside the Murray Darling Basin: having been a resident of the area for over seventy years, I don't need a meteorologist to tell me that the climate is becoming increasingly unpredictable. Higher average temperatures (no significant frost damage to vines in Sunraysia for about 20 years) and near record high temperatures over prolonged periods, extended droughts ( another few months of the Millennium Drought and all the major rivers would probably have ceased to flow (the Darling-Barka did, to much publicity and wringing of hands, followed by a slap on the wrist to the flood plain harvesters up north). Now we have a third (unprecedented?) consecutive year of La Niña. And no prospect of significantly increasing water storages to relieve both drought and flooding.

If this trend continues, and worsens, which seems reasonably likely, then much, if not most, existing primary production in the central and southern districts of the Basin will become unviable some time in the not too distant future. It probably isn't practical to cover every tree orchard, vineyard, or vegetable crop with shade cloth. (Travelling through Loxton recently, it was noticeable how much young citrus is in fact now under shade. Unsurprisingly, the date palm plantation appears to be coping without it.

If any of this comes about, then Select will have to develop a survival strategy. I know that they tried almonds in WA and sold out after only two years, so they won't repeat that experiment. But there is enough rural experience on the current Board to devise, prepare, and if necessary, implement some practical ideas.