Fred McGrath Weber remembers the tough decisions his family had to make the last time the ACT was in a drought. The 30-year-old, who works on his family farm Majura House, recalled how they were forced to sell some of their sheep and find alternative land for others to graze on so the vegetation on their farm could recover.
"All that takes a lot of time and energy because you're having to travel and monitor the livestock," he said.
"There's fencing and water costs and everything like that involved as well as leasing the land."
The territory saw nearly a decade of drought from 2001 to 2009 and then another years-long stretch in 2017-2020.
These prolonged dry spells have devastating consequences for farmers and experts project that the worsening climate crisis will exacerbate the phenomenon, making droughts more frequent and severe.
This week, the ACT government released its first drought resilience plan for the region, which aims to help territory's farming and rural community prepare for future droughts.
The draft plan says some of the most significant impacts will include less water availability and loss of biodiversity while pests and weeds spread.
The report also flags "significant social impacts" on farmers, including a fall in income, higher workloads as well as a physical and mental health decline.
To offset the climate impact, the government has put forward a raft of measures and strategies, including changing the size of farms, identifying less water intensive production options and investigating water-sharing arrangements.
The plan also discusses the importance of mental health services to support the wellbeing of farmers, such as telephone and financial counselling.
Mr McGrath Weber, who is also president of the Rural Landholders' Association, praised the plan but said he wanted to see more financial investment in agriculture from the ACT.
"Farmers are responsible for managing 15 percent of the territory and it's essential that they are recognised for their efforts," he said.
"All these strategies and plans are fantastic but at the end of the day, there needs to be investment made and implementation strategies to ensure that the ACT government is supporting food production.
"Also there needs to be reduction of barriers around diversifying farm income. For example, these adaptation strategies and the outcomes will not be possible without reducing the significant cost associated with farm diversification and the supply chain."
Meanwhile, farmers and rural landholders have already been making preparations for future droughts.
"We've been looking at our land planning and planting, investing a significant amount of money into fencing on our property. [We are] creating smaller paddocks so we can rotate our stock better and [we are] using technology like electric fencing that enables us to control our livestock and protect those assets on farm," Mr McGrath Weber said.
Mount Majura Vineyard has seen firsthand how climate change has affected their grapes. The vineyard has been watching their chardonnay grapes ripen more than a month earlier than they did a few decades ago.
Part owner Frank van de Loo said his vineyard was preparing for the bigger picture, readying for future droughts by being more conservative with irrigation and minimising the amount of water the vineyard needed.
"We've installed some soil moisture monitoring equipment, which means that our the irrigation that we do is based on real data rather than actually based just on sort of gut feel or digging a hole and looking at how wet the soil feels," he said.
"We can go to our computer and look at how much moisture is actually in the soil and how the vines are actually responding to that moisture and by how much stress they have by using another sensor."
The public can have a say on the draft plan until March 14.
