Newsletter on bioeconomic and social research on
Sustainability and Economics in Agriculture
Issue 12, September 2002
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Newsletter on bioeconomic and social research on |
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Editor:
Dave Pannell, University of Western Australia, email
David.Pannell@uwa.edu.au SEA Project main funder: Grains Research and Development Corporation Address of the SEA News web site: http://www1.crcsalinity.com.au/newsletter/sea/ |
In This Issue
Editorial
In Brief
New web site for Cooperative Research Centre for Plant-Based Management of
Dryland Salinity - OECD meeting on agri-biodiversity indicators -
Policy and Economic Research Unit newsletter - Salinity
economics workshop
Articles
How do we move salinity policy
forward?
The role of saltland pastures in the
farming system
Triple-bottom-line accounting: How
serious is it?
Adoption of
herbicide resistance management practices by farmers
Loving, losing and living with our
environment
Options for dryland salinity
management
Research
Methodology
Prose,
psychopaths and persistence (personal perspectives on publishing)
Book Review
"The Skeptical Environmentalist" by
Bjorn Lomborg
Regular
Bits and Pieces
News and coming events -
Overview of the SEA Project - People in the SEA team - Publications available
This issue is the first of two that will be published in quick succession, to clear a backlog of articles that have built up in the eight months since issue 11. As you will see, the project team has continued its usual high productivity, so I hope you will find something of interest and of value in the two issues.
There are two new features of the SEA News site: an author index and a topic index of all the articles included in SEA News. These complement the existing issue-by-issue index and the lists of papers on particular topics: salinity and agricultural extension/adoption of innovations.
Issues 12 and 13 are a finale for the SEA project in its current form, although SEA News will continue, as outlined in issue 13.
David Pannell, September 2002
Web site for Cooperative Research Centre
for Plant-Based Management of Dryland Salinity.
The full web site
for the CRC is
now available at http://www.crcsalinity.com,
replacing the interim site publicised in the last issue of SEA News.
OECD meeting on agri-biodiversity
indicators.
At this recent OECD meeting, held in Zurich, November 2001, Australia was
represented and provided a paper. The 30 papers presented at the meeting
are available at the OECD website given below. Note also that pdf files of
the 3 volume series on OECD Environmental Indicators for Agriculture (including
the latest volume 3 published in 2001) is available at that site:
http://www.oecd.org/EN/home/0,,EN-home-150-nodirectorate-no-no-no-1,00.html.
Policy and Economic Research Unit
newsletter.
The
July Newsletter from the Policy and Economic Research Unit (PERU) of CSIRO Land
and Water is available at
http://www.clw.csiro.au/research/agriculture/economic/
now. That web site also contains a range of publications from the PERU group,
which is led by Mike Young.
Salinity economics workshop.
"Dryland Salinity: Economic Issues and Farm,
Catchment and Policy Levels", Pre-Conference Workshop, Australian Agricultural
and Resource Economics Society, 11 Feb 2003, Perth (Fremantle).
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How do we move salinity
policy forward?
by Dave
Pannell
"We need to reverse the planning approach so that it is asset-based and not catchment-based." |
On 8 April 2002, the New South
Wales Legislative Assembly Select Committee on Salinity held a full-day seminar
at the NSW Parliament House in Sydney on the topic "Investing in Solutions to
Salinity". David Pannell was invited to present the keynote address at the
seminar. The talk covered a number of popular myths about salinity, including
the general appropriateness of "Integrated Catchment Management" for addressing
salinity. David emphasised the need to carefully prioritise public investments
in salinity, the need to live with some salinity, and the need for investment in
R&D and industry development to create profitable salinity management options
for farmers.
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The role of saltland pastures in
the farming system
by Michael O'Connell
and John Young "Establishing saltland pastures on saline land of high productivity is unlikely to deliver large profits due to the opportunity cost of annual crops and pastures." |
Saltland pastures
in Western Australia are likely to be profitable across a range of scenarios. However, the optimal
area of pasture to establish will vary considerably according to site characteristics and
market conditions. Key profit drivers for the saltland pasture system include
summer/autumn feed value, amount of feed available for grazing in summer/autumn
and establishment costs.
For the full article, see this web page:
http://www.general.uwa.edu.au/u/dpannell/dpap0208.htm
(93K)
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Triple-bottom-line
accounting: How serious is it?
by Steven Schilizzi
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The TBL refers to three key dimensions of business performance: financial,
environmental and social. The idea sounds straightforward, but implementing TBL
accounting in practice involves a range of difficulties. Most importantly, there
is no accepted framework to bring all three dimensions consistently together.
Wide uptake of the idea will require the development of new accounting
techniques and frameworks, as well as new theory.
For the full article, see this web page:
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Adoption of herbicide
resistance management practices by Australian grain growers
by
Rick Llewellyn,
Bob Lindner, Dave Pannell and Steve Powles "Perceptions relating to the exhaustibility of the herbicide resource were important." |
Extension programs in Australia
are encouraging farmers to adopt integrated weed management (IWM) practices. We
collected data on their actual adoption of these practices in a survey of
Western Australian grain growers, and analysed the data statistically. IWM
adoption was strongly influenced by the farmer's perceptions of IWM practices
and expectations about the future of the herbicide resource. The results
indicate that farmers regard IWM as an information-intensive package of
techniques, and that appropriate extension can increase the rate of adoption.
For the full article, see this web page:
| Loving, losing and living
with our environment
by
Dave Pannell
"The environment can and should hold its own in the allocation of resources, but one cannot sustain an argument that it should take precedence over all other uses of public funds." |
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This paper was presented at the "Getting it
Right" conference in Adelaide, 11-12 March 2002. In it, David observes that
the politicisation of the environment since the early 1980s has raised the level
of resources available and helped to increase awareness of the issues.
Unfortunately this politicisation has meant that decisions about environmental
management occur in a sphere where it is difficult for them to be anything other
than superficial, whimsical, poorly informed, subject to pressure groups and
unresponsive to changed information or changed circumstances. The political and
bureaucratic processes that drive environmental policy have done a fair job of
dealing with the social, economic and ethical dimensions of big environmental
problems, but an extremely poor job of the scientific issues. Profound
implications of latest research are missing from the policies, either because
the research is not known, its implications are unrecognised, or the
implications are politically unpalatable.
For the full article, see this web page:
http://www.agrifood.info/Connections/Autumn2002/Pannell.htm
(80K)
| Options for dryland salinity
management in low rainfall agricultural environments in Western Australia
by
Michele John and
Ross Kingwell "There is no one solution or management tool to address dryland salinity, water logging and inundation." |
Currently, there are very few options for
salinity management in low rainfall environments (less than 350mm annual
rainfall). The challenge for salinity management in traditional farming systems,
is to balance the profitability of annual crop based systems with sustainable
high water using options and engineering solutions. This paper reviews
literature on the potential profitability and water use of two developing
perennial plant based systems (oil mallees and saltland pastures) and and
engineering approach (deep drains), and the trade-off between water use and
profitability objectives within these options as potential salinity management
techniques.
For the full article, see this web page:
http://www.general.uwa.edu.au/u/dpannell/dpap00207.htm
(82K)
Research Methodology
| Prose, persistence and
psychopaths: personal perspectives on publishing
by
Dave Pannell
"The sheer unpredictability of what referees will say still manages to take my breath away at times." |
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This is a paper for researchers. It presents a number of
personal reflections on the publishing process, with the aim of helping aspiring
journal authors to appreciate the nature of the challenge and some of the
requisites for success. The challenges in dealing with referees include the
element of luck involved in securing sympathetic referees, the poor quality of
the reports prepared by some referees, and the slowness of the review and
editorial process. A number of examples from my experiences in agricultural
economics journals are presented. These reveal that one of the most important
characteristics which a journal author needs is persistence.
For the full article, see this web page:
Book Review
"The Skeptical Environmentalist: Measuring the Real State of the World" by Bjorn Lomborg; Reviewed by Dave Pannell
The Skeptical Environmentalist
is a remarkable achievement. If you have read the violent critiques of it, do
not be put off. You will scarcely recognise it as the same book. I recommend it
as essential reading for any open-minded person with an interest in the
environment.
For the full review, see this web page:
http://www.general.uwa.edu.au/u/dpannell/lomborg.htm
(18K)
Regular Bits and Pieces
News and Coming Events
Overview of the SEA Project
This project has a strong integrative focus, bringing together several sustainability issues and considering their biological, physical and economic implications at the whole-farm level. The main issues being researched in the project are soil salinisation, soil acidification, management of herbicide-resistant weeds, farmer adoption of sustainable practices and the economics of monitoring sustainability indicators. Main funding: Grains Research & Development Corporation. Commencement: 01-Aug-97 Completion: 30-Jun-02
People in the SEA Team
Publications available
As well as the
articles summarised in this Newsletter, the SEA Project has a range of
publications available. A list is shown at the following web page address. You
can view and print most of the papers directly in your browser.
Web page:
http://www.general.uwa.edu.au/u/dpannell/seapprs.htm
Papers that focus on
agricultural extension, and adoption and diffusion of innovations in
agriculture:
Web page:
http://www.general.uwa.edu.au/u/dpannell/adoppprs.htm
Papers that focus on
dryland salinity:
Web page:
http://www.general.uwa.edu.au/u/dpannell/saltpprs.htm
Other issues of SEA News
Copyright note: Some articles in SEA news have subsequently been submitted for publication in journals or books. SEA News contains pre-publication versions of these articles. They have not been subject to peer review, and copyright rests with the authors. When an article is formally published, the version on the SEA News web site is not updated to the published version, as this would violate copyright. However, the citation shown on the web page is updated to allow readers to identify the published version. Readers are encouraged to make use of the material present on the web site, provided that its source is acknowledged. Readers who wish to make direct quotes from an article in SEA News should not attribute the quote to a more formal (e.g. journal) published version of the paper without checking the published version, since the quote may have been altered or even omitted from the published version.
If you have any comments about SEA News or wish to make additions to or deletions from our mailing list, contact David.Pannell@uwa.edu.au
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