2002

Recent widespread discussion including policy statements by government suggest that more authority should be devolved to local communities to make decisions about the rural localities in which they live. The paper evaluates existing instruments, including village appraisals and village design statements, against the criteria of subsidia ....

Land, Water and Wool is a new partnership between Australian Wool Innovation Ltd and Land and Water Resources Research and Development Corporation (LWRRDC). This fact sheet briefly describes the Managing Pastoral Country subprogram which aims to work with the wool industry in the pastoral zone to develop, test and implement best pr ....

The final report of a project to develop a method for mapping regional capacity to adopt more sustainable natural resource management presents a framework for the characterisation of regional community capacity for sustainable resource management. The framework identifies ten elements of capacity that span human capital, produced e ....

Significant changes to all aspects of social and economic life are expected to occur as a result of the increasing proportion of older people in the community. This report, a joint venture of the Australian Institute of Health and the Commonwealth Government's Ageing and Aged Care Division, presents current demographic data about a ....

Objective: To investigate the extent of participation in cervical cancer screening among women who live in discrete rural and remote Indigenous communities in Queensland. Design: Descriptive analysis of data from the Queensland Health Pap Smear Registry for the period March 1999 to February 2001. Subjects: Women aged 20–69 years who had give ....

The potential to use deep-rooted perennials, such as lucerne, for excess groundwater management is limited in annual cropping enterprises in the grain growing regions of southeastern Australia. A scoping study, using a simplified model of plant water use linked to winter water balance was conducted to determine the need for hydrolo ....

This paper explains that economic and social indicators such as population and employment present only a partial view of regional conditions, and show areas of deep decline to media and government policy makers. However, the author contends that towns and regions travel in cycles of economic, social and community change, that need ....

The Australian desert's unique social, economic and environmental characteristics create challenges in supporting its 179,000 people. This report presents research commissioned as part of supporting documentation for a proposal to establish a Desert Knowledge Cooperative Research Centre (CRC). The aim was to explore the scope for d ....

Traditionally, many of Australia’s rural communities have been heavily dependent on the agriculture sector for their economic prosperity. Changes in the structure of agriculture have driven changes in the levels and patterns of employment, educational opportunities and the level and location of rural services. All of these factors have c ....

Using markets mechanisms for tradeable water or pollution rights are being increasingly offered as rational solutions for environmental problems. The rational pursuit of personal gain through trading is assumed to promote increased efficiency in resource use and promote a reduction in the negative aspects of resource utilization. T ....

Over the past ten years the concept of regional clustering has gained much popularity in business, government and the academic world. In general, geographically concentrated cooperation is viewed as an organisational survival strategy in today’s intensely competitive business environment. Some authors even suggest that regional clustering is pa ....

In early 2003 the Federal Government will receive a major report on regional business performance and impediments to employment and enterprise growth in regional Australia. This is a major opportunity to draw together into an integrated plan for the regions the key drivers for regional development. Amongst the central issues the report must de ....

The number of Tasmanians relying on government pensions and benefits as their main source of income is much higher than the national average, and Anglicare's research has shown that low income earners in Tasmania consistently identify the cost of essential items as key causes of household financial crisis. The author looks at regio ....

Centrelink has embarked on a Regional Microsimulation Modelling Project. The modelling work is being undertaken jointly with NATSEM. The purpose of the model under development, the Customer Service Projection (CuSP) Model, is to provide a tool that will assist decision-making through short to medium-term projection of customers and ....