A tool to inform and build resilience
The Drought Resilience Self-Assessment Tool (DR.SAT) is a free tool that enables farmers to assess their resilience against climate change including drought and other climate risks. Resilience assessments include financial, personal & social, and environmental indicators. Based on farmers’ individual assessments, the tool provides tailored options and resources to support farmers to build resilience.
The assessment is be based on farmer-supplied information, farmers have complete control over their information to maintain their privacy. The tool also contains:
- regularly updated satellite imagery
- remote sensed data
- climate projections that inform resilience assessments and supports decision making on physical climate change risks.
DR.SAT is designed to supplement (rather than replace) existing tools, programs, networks, and extension support.
Explore the live tool
We’ve been talking to farmers around Australia to help design and develop DR.SAT. The live tool is now available, please explore the DR.SAT. It would be great to hear your feedback, particularly so we can continue to improve the tool for future updates and releases
User engagement in pilot regions
8 pilot regions have been identified to focus on engagement with farmers before scaling to other regions. These DR.SAT pilot regions are also consistent with Climate Services for Agriculture (CSA).
The first 4 pilot regions announced in March 2021 are the focus of the beta version of DR.SAT. They include:
- Queensland Dry Tropics – including the Burdekin Dry Tropics Region. Key centres include Townsville, Charters Towers and Bowen.
- Condamine and the Northern Tablelands – including the Condamine catchment and Northern Tablelands NRM regions. Key centres include Toowoomba, Stanthorpe, Warwick, Armidale and Glen Innes.
- Victorian Mallee and south-east South Australia – including the Sunraysia and Wimmera / Mallee regions of Victoria and Riverland and Mallee regions of South Australia. Key centres include Mildura, Swan Hill, Renmark, Berri, Ouyen and Horsham.
- Western Australian Wheatbelt – including the Wheatbelt NRM region and surrounding areas. Key centres include Northam and Narrogin.
In November 2021, an additional 4 pilot areas were announced. DR.SAT will expand into these regions in future releases:
- Tropical North – including coastal Queensland between Townsville and Cooktown, the NT Katherine region and north-eastern WA in the Ord River region. Key centres include Cairns, Darwin, Katherine, and Kununurra.
- Central West New South Wales – including the broad-acre cropping regions. Key centres include Dubbo, Parkes, and West Wyalong.
- Riverina and Goulburn-Murray – including the irrigated area within the southern Murray-Darling Basin. Key centres include Shepparton and Griffith.
- Gippsland and Northern Tasmania – including the irrigated and non-irrigated dairy and vegetable growing regions. Key centres include Bairnsdale, Sale, Yarram, Burnie, and Launceston.
Indicative boundaries are shown on the map below:
For further information on how you can provide feedback, look in the Questions and Answers below or contact DroughtResilience@agriculture.gov.au.
Questions and Answers
| March 2021 |
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|---|---|
| July 2021 |
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| July - November 2021 |
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| December 2021 | Live tool launched. Farmers anywhere in Australia are able to:
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| January – May 2022 | Further engagement with farmers in pilot regions to support development of the platform (including joint engagement with CSA). |
| April 2022 | Live tool updated.
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| July 2022 | Live tool updated.
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| July 2022 – June 2024 | Tool further developed to include additional resilience assessment modules for more commodities and regions. |
We’re looking for people working in agriculture in each pilot region to participate in user-engagement activities up until June 2023.
This includes farmers, advisers, extension officers, natural resource managers, as well as businesses supporting agriculture, such as suppliers, financiers, insurers and other industry and community networks.
Different options will be available for participation, depending on your time, interest and availability.
You can register your interest by contacting DroughtResilience@agriculture.gov.au or through the ‘Help’ function within the tool. We’ll then be in touch with further details.
As a participant, you may be invited to attend regular workshops or participate in interviews with product developers to June 2023. Depending on your time, interest and availability, you could be involved in:
- helping to develop climate information products, to assist farm businesses understand future climate and how that could impact the key commodities in their region
- defining information needs and designing the look and feel of the DR. SAT
Key activities are likely to include:
- online and/or face-to-face group workshops
- one-on-one interviews
- website testing, surveys or other online activities.
Recordings of the first series of online workshops held in pilot regions in October and November 2021 are available on request by emailing DroughtResilience@agriculture.gov.au.
This will depend on the type of activity you are involved in, your interests and availability.
Activities could occur online, in-person or over the phone.
Yes, it is intended that the tools will be extended beyond pilot regions to reach additional commodities and farmers.
In the initial release of DR.SAT our focus is on two key commodities across the first four pilot regions, however the tool can be used by other farmers. Farmers anywhere can use DR.SAT to complete a self-assessment on their personal/social and financial resilience, review remote-sensing data about their farm and view farm-scale climate projections.
You can provide feedback within the tool or by emailing DroughtResilience@agriculture.gov.au.
Funding information
Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu have been selected to design and deliver the tool within a select number of pilot regions over the next 12 months.
Find details of the payment information for the DR.SAT program, as required under section 27A of the Future Drought Fund Act 2019 below.
Downloads
Funding Information - Drought Resilience Self-Assessment Tool (PDF 257 KB)
Funding Information - Drought Resilience Self-Assessment Tool (DOCX 687 KB)
The department is working on creating an accessible version of these documents. If you have difficulty accessing these files, visit web accessibility for assistance.