The Murray-Darling Basin Authority has confirmed October 8 as the date it will finally make public its recommended cuts to water allocations.

The delay - the third in three months - means the community has to endure another five weeks of crippling uncertainty.

With predictions the guide could propose cuts of anywhere between 5 and 65 per cent, representatives from local industry and interest groups gathered at Murrumbidgee Irrigation's headquarters yesterday to discuss how to respond.

NSW Farmers Association water spokesman John Ward said he hoped the repeated delays were not part of a plan to break the resolve of communities facing catastrophic cuts to allocations.

"I'm very concerned that the community is burning out," Mr Ward said.

"They're tired, they're having to wait another five weeks and who's to say the MDBA won't come with something else to delay its release?

"I agree with the NSW Irrigators Council, the MDBA should bring the bloody thing out now so that we know where we stand."

Murrumbidgee Irrigation chairwoman Gillian Kirkup said she hoped the authority did in fact do as it claimed and use the delays to improve the social and economic elements of the guide.

"It's good to have got a date as I think it gives people something to focus on," Mrs Kirkup said.

"But we just hope they've used this extra time to put more rigour around the process, bring more balance to the process and to understand they must take into account the relationship between regional communities and water."

Riverina Citrus executive officer Scot MacDonald said his group would engage consultants to analyse the guide and determine how it would affect its members.

He said that while he understood the community needed to make its opposition clear if the guide contained substantial cuts to allocations, there was little point in simply opposing without offering alternative solutions.

"The community has to show that unity and feeling, but when you talk to government policy makers they really want solutions," Mr MacDonald said.

"So when ever you have a large meeting I don't think that is as conducive to coming up with well-defined solutions.

"We have to give solutions in terms of things like whether there be more emphasis on water buybacks, or should there be more emphasise on infrastructure upgrades."