A decision support process to compare Riparian revegetation options in Scheu Creek catchment in North Queensland

While riparian vegetation can play a major role in protecting land, water a nd natural habitat in catchments, there are high costs associated with tree planting and establishment and in diverting land from cropping. The distri bution of costs and benefits of riparian revegetation creates conflicts in the objectives of various stakeholder groups. Multicriteria analysis provid es an appropriate tool to evaluate alternative riparian revegetation option s, and to accommodate the conflicting views of various stakeholder groups. This paper discusses an application of multicriteria analysis in an evaluat ion of riparian revegetation policy options for Scheu Creek, a small sub-ca tchment in the Johnstone River catchment in north Queensland, Australia. Cl ear differences are found in the rankings of revegetation options for diffe rent stakeholder groups with respect to environmental, social and economic impacts. Implementation of a revegetation option will involve considerable cost for landholders for the benefits of society. Queensland legislation do es not provide a means to require farmers to implement riparian revegetatio n, hence the need for subsidies, tau incentives and moral suasion. (C) 2001 Academic Press.