Wheatbelt Region (Western Australia)

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Wheatbelt region
Wa region wheatbelt.gif
Location of the Wheatbelt region
structure
State : Australia Australia
State : Flag of Western Australia.svg Western Australia
Dates and numbers
Area : 154,862 km²
Residents : 69,000 (2012)
Population density : 0.4 inhabitants / km²
Quirading wheat field and wheat bin.jpg
Wheat field at Quairading

Coordinates: 33 ° 0 ′  S , 117 ° 0 ′  E The Western Australian Wheat Belt is one of 9 geographic regions in the state of Western Australia defined by the Regional Development Commissions Act 1993 for the Improvement of the Economic Condition in Rural Areas. Alternative terms in common parlance are Heartlands and Wheat-Sheep Zone .

location

The Wheatbelt Region partially encloses the metropolitan area of Perth , which is not dealt with by the 1993 law, is bordered to the north by the Mid West region , to the east by the Goldfields-Esperance region , which are sometimes understood as two separate regions in common parlance, and to the south on Great Southern and South West . In the west, the Wheatbelt region stretches north from Perth to the Indian Ocean , while south of the metropolis the small region of Peel lies between the coast and the Heartlands.

In total, the Western Australian wheat belt comprises around 69,000 inhabitants on 154,862 km² including some islands off the coast. The population is widely distributed across the sparsely populated country, and only 16,000 people live in the small towns of Northam , Narrogin , Merredin , Moora, and York .

Wheat cultivation and sheep breeding

Silo at Quairading
Salinisation damage at Babakin

The region got its name from wheat cultivation. This was introduced by the European settlers in the course of exploring the country. The first settlements inland from Perth were in Dale and the Avon Valley, where there was very fertile soil. The first inland settlement in Western Australia founded for agricultural purposes was York in 1831. This was followed by the settlement of the heartlands around the present-day provincial towns of Bruce Rock, Narembeen, Corrigin, Kondinin and Kulin , which John Septimus Roe had discovered by the middle of the 19th century. Around 1840, the Victoria Plains was discovered northeast of Perth, which was initially leased as grazing land. At the turn of the 20th century, many of these leases expired and settlers who settled in this region afterwards also began to grow wheat on the more fertile soils. After the end of the First World War, when a large number of former soldiers wanted to colonize the land, the Kwongan heaths were opened up, where it became clear that wheat could also be grown profitably with appropriate fertilization. This led to a massive expansion of the wheat growing area. A network of railway lines was set up and finally water was brought to the farms so that cattle could be kept there all year round.

At the beginning of the 20th century, wheat cultivation had firmly established itself as an economic factor in these heartlands; At the same time (1901–1907) the first of a total of three Rabbit-Proof Fences was erected over a length of 1837 km from north to south to protect against rabbits advancing from the east . Large parts of what was once the longest fence in the world with the original posts are still preserved today.

In the following decades the wheat-growing area expanded to the southeast. The large-scale production according to a mechanized system, which requires the use of seed drills and combine harvesters as well as sufficient transport routes to the silos and grain mills , goes back to the 1920s and 1930s.

For this purpose, a total of 18 million hectares of bushland was gradually cleared. Today two thirds of the total Australian wheat production , which ranks 7th in the world with 24 million tons, comes from this region. Australian wheat is exported all over the world, particularly to Middle East and Central Asia, Southeast Asia and Japan.

Western Australian wheat is sown in autumn (March / April), grows in winter, and is harvested in spring (October / November). In the frost-free, mild winters (15–20 ° C) there is no rest phase, in contrast to the US and European winter wheat , and there is sufficient rainfall only in the cooler months.

The second most important industry in the Wheatbelt region is sheep breeding. Of the four species of merino sheep introduced into Australia by Europeans in the 19th century, the Peppin Merino and South Australian Merino dominate in Western Australia . They supply 50% of Australia's wool production, with medium-fine and coarse wool predominating.

However, both branches of the economy are in decline and endangered by a creeping climate and environmental change due to the large-scale clearing, which has only been given increased attention since the end of the 20th century. On the one hand, warming and decreasing precipitation result in the soil drying out and wind erosion. At the same time, when it rains, water that seeps away too quickly and which can no longer be absorbed by deep-rooted plants as it was in the times of the original vegetation, leads to a rise in the groundwater level. The water then dissolves an extremely salty soil layer just below the surface of the earth and drives these salts upwards. Increasingly, arable and pasture areas in the Wheatbelt region are becoming deserted due to salinization; in places large salt lakes have formed. Countermeasures have been reforestation programs since the 1990s, the sustainability of which remains to be seen.

Mining

In the arid east of the region, which is unsuitable for agriculture, on the border with the neighboring Goldfields-Esperance region , iron ore and nickel are mined alongside other minerals. East of York, the historic West Australian gold rush route of the 19th century ran via Merredin and Southern Cross to the sites in Coolgardie and Kalgoorlie-Boulder .

tourism

Tourism has been an emerging industry in the Wheatbelt region since the end of the 20th century. Organized group excursions from the metropolis of Perth, 350 km to the north-west, stop at several places every day , which are also visited by individual travelers. Attractions advertised by the tourism authority are for example

  • the listed city of York on the Avon River ;
  • the historic heartlands of the wheat belt - also known as the Open Wheatbelt and encompassing approx. 30,000 km² - in which, for example, the rock amphitheater and sculpture park by Bruce Rock, the dog cemetery in Corrigin and the wildflower reserves near Kulin are frequently visited;
  • the granite rock formation Hyden Rock, to which the natural monument Wave Rock belongs, surrounded by an area of ​​original bushland ; this is one of the main destinations for excursion tourism from Perth.

The coast up to approx. 150 km north of the metropolis at Lancelin is relevant for bathing and leisure tourism in the city of Perth ; Indian Ocean Drive, which was only opened at the end of 2010, continues to Cervantes ( Pinnacles / border to the Mid West region ). The inland of this northern section, although belonging to the Wheat Belt region , is not used for agricultural purposes, but original bushland.

Administrative division

The Western Australian Wheat Belt comprises the following Local Government Areas in Western Australia :

supporting documents

literature

  • Günther, Janine / Mohr, Jens: Western Australia and the Top End, Verlag 360 °, 1st edition 2005, ISBN 3-9809763-0-0

Web links

Commons : Wheatbelt Region  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Single receipts

  1. ^ Wheatbelt Development Commission - Our Region . Retrieved June 11, 2012 (English)
  2. ↑ Ian Rowley : The Galah - Behavioral Ecology of Galahs , Surrey Beatty & Sons in collaboration with The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization, Division of Wildlife and Ecology and the Royal Australasian Ornithologists Union, Chipping Norton, 1990, ISBN 0-949324-27- 2 , p. 7