The social impacts of drought: a social work response
'Australia's worst drought in 100 years' is the way many commentators reported the drought that engulfed much of the continent in the early 2000s. While many reports focused on the economic and environmental impacts of the drought, there was little reporting of the impacts on the people most affected - rural residents on farms, in small businesses and in small communities. Research was undertaken in 2003 to examine the social impacts of the crisis. Three contrasting communities were studied in some depth - one a remote community, another a broad-acre cropping area and a third a dryland irrigation area. In each community in-depth interviews and focus groups were conducted with farm family representatives, small business operators, welfare service providers, health workers and other community key informants. This paper reports on the social impacts and their welfare implications and draws out the issues for social work. What is clear is that there are major gaps in service delivery in rural areas and that these gaps have been accentuated during this time of crisis. The paper makes recommendations about ways that social workers might support rural community capacity building as communities emerge from drought.