One component of biosecurity is protection against invasive alien species, which are one of the most important threats worldwide to native biodiversity and economic profitability in various sectors, including agriculture. However, agricultural producers are not homogeneous. They may have...

Cities have been investing heavily in recent years to augment their water supply, focusing on either stormwater harvesting or desalination. A more optimal strategy is to consider all sources of water jointly, thereby allowing for hedging of supply risks. A portfolio model of urban water supply...

Motivated by recent EC proposals to “strengthen risk management tools” in the CAP in relation to farmers’ increased exposure to market price risk, this paper draws attention to a potential negative consequence of such a change in the CAP – an associated increase in cheating behaviour by...

One approach to rationalising policies for addressing potentially catastrophic climate change when such policies may prove unnecessary is to suppose the policies provide a form of social insurance even in the presence of pure uncertainty. Then, provided the policies are effective, such insurance...

Environmental policy is evolving rapidly in the international arena with an increasing number of multilateral environmental agreements being negotiated in a range of forums. The issue of risk management has figured prominently in these processes, with the OECD risk reduction strategy for lead...

Environmental, social, and economic attributes are important for the sustainability of a farming system. Resilience is also important, yet has seldom been directly considered in evaluations of economic sustainability. In economic terms, resilience has to do with the capacity of the farm business...

Australian farmers have been warned of increases in wool auction price fluctuations since 2000 (Kingwell), yet 85% of producers continue to sell their wool on the highly volatile, open-cry auction system (Bolt 2004). It has been suggested that forward selling is one method available to farmers...

The regulation of river systems to meet water demands for irrigation in the southern Murray Darling Basin has changed the timing and the volume of the natural pattern of flows. Australian governments have committed to restoring, in part, winter and spring flow regimes to preserve and enhance the...

Weather derivatives are designed to hedge the volumetric risk associated with unfavourable weather. They have the ability to hedge weather related volume or yield risk for the agricultural sector, although there are still many hurdles to their widespread implementation in Australian agriculture....

This paper presents the results obtained from two experimental auctions regarding consumer willingness-to-pay (WTP) for food safety improvements. The research found a positive WTP for food safety. However WTP amounts are different when participants bid with objective risk information as compared...