Nature futures: mapping pathways to prosperity for people and nature. Population growth, consumption and trade are direct socio-economic drivers of land use change and climate change, which determine where species can persist. The UN Sustainable Development Goals and national policies acknowledge the dependence of people on nature and the impact of socio-economic drivers on nature. However, few analyses of impacts on nature explicitly incorporate socio-economic drivers. Utilising a novel modelli ....Nature futures: mapping pathways to prosperity for people and nature. Population growth, consumption and trade are direct socio-economic drivers of land use change and climate change, which determine where species can persist. The UN Sustainable Development Goals and national policies acknowledge the dependence of people on nature and the impact of socio-economic drivers on nature. However, few analyses of impacts on nature explicitly incorporate socio-economic drivers. Utilising a novel modelling framework and high-performance computing we will integrate economic, land use and biodiversity models to evaluate: (i) policies and incentives for increasing national vegetation cover for carbon sequestration and habitat, and (ii) global risks to nature posed by land use change under future geopolitical scenarios.Read moreRead less
New methods for modelling complex trends in climate and energy time series. The project aims to contribute to Australian and international efforts on emission control by advancing the methods for quantifying the relationships between energy production, emission and climate, and assessing the real and financial risks associated with changing the ways in which economies produce and use energy. The project is interdisciplinary and expects to develop new knowledge in the areas of energy and climate ....New methods for modelling complex trends in climate and energy time series. The project aims to contribute to Australian and international efforts on emission control by advancing the methods for quantifying the relationships between energy production, emission and climate, and assessing the real and financial risks associated with changing the ways in which economies produce and use energy. The project is interdisciplinary and expects to develop new knowledge in the areas of energy and climate econometrics. The anticipated outcomes of this project are new methods for modelling variables with complex trends, and an innovative data-driven approach for learning from policy experiences of other countries. This should provide significant benefits by enabling evidence-based policy making in the era of climate change. Read moreRead less
Incorporating the gains from healthy ageing in health system planning. This project aims to develop evidence-based fit-for-purpose economic models for planning future capacity for public health programmes by developing new methodological approaches incorporating dynamic changes in health and health risks over time. The project expects to generate new knowledge on the impact of improvements in physical and mental well-being on funding and capacity requirements for public programmes to meet tomorr ....Incorporating the gains from healthy ageing in health system planning. This project aims to develop evidence-based fit-for-purpose economic models for planning future capacity for public health programmes by developing new methodological approaches incorporating dynamic changes in health and health risks over time. The project expects to generate new knowledge on the impact of improvements in physical and mental well-being on funding and capacity requirements for public programmes to meet tomorrow’s needs for care instead of projecting yesterday’s use of care. Expected outcomes include new economic models responsive to changes in population characteristics, conditions and contexts. The proposed research should provide significant benefits through improving efficiency of public investments in health.Read moreRead less
Loss-based Bayesian Prediction. This project proposes a new paradigm for prediction. Using state-of-the-art computational methods, the project aims to produce accurate, fit for purpose, predictions which, by design, reduce the loss incurred when the prediction is inaccurate. Theoretical validation of the new predictive method, without reliance on knowledge of the correct statistical model, is an expected outcome, as is an extensive numerical assessment of its performance in empirical settings. T ....Loss-based Bayesian Prediction. This project proposes a new paradigm for prediction. Using state-of-the-art computational methods, the project aims to produce accurate, fit for purpose, predictions which, by design, reduce the loss incurred when the prediction is inaccurate. Theoretical validation of the new predictive method, without reliance on knowledge of the correct statistical model, is an expected outcome, as is an extensive numerical assessment of its performance in empirical settings. The new paradigm should produce significant benefits for all fields in which the consequences of predictive inaccuracy are severe. Problems that lead to substantial economic, financial or environmental loss if predictions are incorrect will be given particular attention.Read moreRead less
Robust methods for heteroscedastic regression models for time series. What is the variability of the exchange rate of the Euro to the Australian dollar? Can the use of the electrocardiogram of a patient be improved as a diagnostic tool for heart disease? A well-known limitation of the existing statistical methods for answering these types of questions is that a small proportion of extreme observations have the potential to lead to results that are more in agreement with the outliers than with bu ....Robust methods for heteroscedastic regression models for time series. What is the variability of the exchange rate of the Euro to the Australian dollar? Can the use of the electrocardiogram of a patient be improved as a diagnostic tool for heart disease? A well-known limitation of the existing statistical methods for answering these types of questions is that a small proportion of extreme observations have the potential to lead to results that are more in agreement with the outliers than with bulk of the data. As a consequence, the statistical analyses may lead to wrong conclusions. This project aims to develop new methodologies to solve this problem for a large class of studies. Applications to stock market risk, exchange rate, and diagnosis of heart diseases will illustrate the new methods.Read moreRead less
Fiscal policy and unemployment in an open economy. This project aims to improve our understanding of the impact of commodity price changes. Over the past two decades, Australia has experienced unprecedented fluctuations in commodity prices. The fiscal position and potential of the economy depends on the extent to which commodity price changes are temporary or permanent. This project will uncover empirical regularities between commodity prices, unemployment across sectors and measures of fiscal p ....Fiscal policy and unemployment in an open economy. This project aims to improve our understanding of the impact of commodity price changes. Over the past two decades, Australia has experienced unprecedented fluctuations in commodity prices. The fiscal position and potential of the economy depends on the extent to which commodity price changes are temporary or permanent. This project will uncover empirical regularities between commodity prices, unemployment across sectors and measures of fiscal policy. The project will build structural models of unemployment which will be estimated and used to assess implications for unemployment and budget deficits of commodity price shocks and to study the optimal design of fiscal policy. The project will benefit the conduct of economic policy in Australia.Read moreRead less