Australian Broadcasting Corporation: For some time, there has been a general recognition that existing drought policy, prepared in the late 1980s and tweaked occasionally since then, is no longer able to respond either to the changing weather patterns or the changing social conditions of rural Australia. As the Bureau of Meteorology recently reminded us: this is an event “without historical precedent”. A unique review of policy is enabling a reconsideration of our responses to climate variability and rural Australia. The …