Australia is subject to widespread droughts, with significant financial implications for agricultural producers, regional, state and national economies. Most economic assessments conclude there is no economic efficiency case for governments to provide drought assistance. However, significant...

Conventional wisdom holds that rainfall variability represents a significant source of agriculture production risk. Surprisingly, there have been very few economic analyses exploring the link between rainfall variability and agriculture production. This paper is intended to investigate the...

Variability of rainfall and commodity prices are important off-farm factors influencing the profitability of dryland farming. Since neither of the above factors can be predicted, lessons from the past can be a preparation for the future. Analysing farm profit over ten years is suggested as a way...

The paper presents empirical evidence of the determinants of catastrophe insurance participation in one of the poorest and most disaster prone countries in the world. In a large-scale household survey carried out in 2006 we ask 3,000 residents in six different districts in Bangladesh facing...

There is potential for over-provision of environmental harms and under-provision of environmental benefits associated with GM crops. As a result, strong public regulation is needed to ensure that full social values are considered. However, one reason for opposition to GM crops is a lack of...

We argue for greater recognition of the risky nature of most policy decisions. In this context we discuss the gulf between public risk perceptions and attitudes and those of 'experts'. Public views of risk are often inconsistent and seemingly irrational. They nevertheless influence policy...

This paper analyses a fisheries management strategy, marine reserves switching, in which a non-fishing area is created, removed, or rotated from one site to another according to economic criteria through time. Using a dynamic optimisation framework under uncertainty, with the different fish...

Australian urban water utilities face a significant challenge in designing appropriate demand management and supply augmentation policies in the presence of increasing water scarcity and uncertainty over future dam inflows. This paper considers the design of optimal demand management and supply...

South Australia’s Minister for Primary Industries, Natural Resources and Regional Development in 1996 delegated to an industry based Apiary Task Force the role to develop and implement a cost effective disease control strategy. Underlying this broad term of reference was the need to increase...

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...