Seeing the good from the trees: remotely sensing the urban forest. Urban forests provide a range of ecosystem services including temperature regulation and rainfall capture, but measuring these benefits is currently prohibitively costly and inaccurate. This project aims to develop a new model of urban forest ecosystem services that uses remotely sensed three dimensional data to map canopy cover. A model using this data, which is being collected by an increasing number of governments, represents ....Seeing the good from the trees: remotely sensing the urban forest. Urban forests provide a range of ecosystem services including temperature regulation and rainfall capture, but measuring these benefits is currently prohibitively costly and inaccurate. This project aims to develop a new model of urban forest ecosystem services that uses remotely sensed three dimensional data to map canopy cover. A model using this data, which is being collected by an increasing number of governments, represents a novel advance on the established methodology that requires expensive and time-consuming fieldwork. The advancements expected to be made in this project will mean that environmental planners will be able to better plan the urban forest so that cities are more liveable and resilient in the face of climate change.Read moreRead less
Improving Government Policy Making and Needs-Based Delivery of Services: Innovative Techniques to Enhance Administrative Data by Adding Socioeconomic Status. This project will create major national benefits by illuminating whether there are significant differences in access to or usage of such key government services as health and education by socio-economic status. Currently, most departments do not fully exploit their administrative data to answer such questions, because of the difficulty of ....Improving Government Policy Making and Needs-Based Delivery of Services: Innovative Techniques to Enhance Administrative Data by Adding Socioeconomic Status. This project will create major national benefits by illuminating whether there are significant differences in access to or usage of such key government services as health and education by socio-economic status. Currently, most departments do not fully exploit their administrative data to answer such questions, because of the difficulty of identifying the socio-economic status of users. This project will help Australia in its on-going but recently intensified efforts to make better use of its administrative data, resulting in a more efficient use of our data resources; better targeting of scare government resources; and improved identification of those in greatest need. Read moreRead less
Managing Australian landscapes to reduce house loss during bushfires. The number of houses destroyed by bushfires in Australia is increasing. This project aims to undertake the first comprehensive analysis of links between land management practices and house loss during bushfires across Australia. Results from this research are expected to improve the ability of authorities, industry and individual home owners to quantify risk from bushfires, and to identify ways that Australian landscapes can b ....Managing Australian landscapes to reduce house loss during bushfires. The number of houses destroyed by bushfires in Australia is increasing. This project aims to undertake the first comprehensive analysis of links between land management practices and house loss during bushfires across Australia. Results from this research are expected to improve the ability of authorities, industry and individual home owners to quantify risk from bushfires, and to identify ways that Australian landscapes can be managed to reduce house losses during bushfires. Results from this research will be communicated directly to key stakeholders including government agencies, industry and home owners.Read moreRead less
Opportunity and Disadvantage: Differences in Wellbeing Among Australia's Adults and Children at a Small Area Level. There is growing interest in regional perspectives in social, economic and health policy, amid increasing evidence that the opportunities and well-being of Australians are greatly affected by where they live. But the evidence base and data required to assess distributional equity issues are deficient. This project will improve the welfare of Australians by generating new insights i ....Opportunity and Disadvantage: Differences in Wellbeing Among Australia's Adults and Children at a Small Area Level. There is growing interest in regional perspectives in social, economic and health policy, amid increasing evidence that the opportunities and well-being of Australians are greatly affected by where they live. But the evidence base and data required to assess distributional equity issues are deficient. This project will improve the welfare of Australians by generating new insights into spatial inequalities; creating new databases about the characteristics of Australians living in each small area; making these new data very widely available through the web; and placing Australia at the international leading edge in the production of spatial socio-economic household data.Read moreRead less
Social Inclusion and Exclusion Among Australia's Children: A Spatial Perspective. Numerous studies have shown that socio-economic disadvantage experienced by children has major adverse effects on health and well-being that persist for the rest of their lives. This project will deliver major national benefits by providing quantitative evidence and analysis of the current spatial distribution of various forms of disadvantage and social exclusion among Australia's children and of any changes to the ....Social Inclusion and Exclusion Among Australia's Children: A Spatial Perspective. Numerous studies have shown that socio-economic disadvantage experienced by children has major adverse effects on health and well-being that persist for the rest of their lives. This project will deliver major national benefits by providing quantitative evidence and analysis of the current spatial distribution of various forms of disadvantage and social exclusion among Australia's children and of any changes to these spatial patterns during the past 15 years. This enhanced evidence base will assist all levels of government in decisions about needs-based planning of government services and in the development of possible policy responses. Read moreRead less
Designing Global Sydney: The negotiation of public and private interests. This project links planning policy, urban design and planning history. It assesses the contribution of design-led policy to reconciling private ambitions for economic growth with aspirations for quality public outcomes in the planning approval processes for major commercial development in the Sydney Central Business District (CBD). Concentrating on the past decade, it aims to examine the changing economic structure of the ....Designing Global Sydney: The negotiation of public and private interests. This project links planning policy, urban design and planning history. It assesses the contribution of design-led policy to reconciling private ambitions for economic growth with aspirations for quality public outcomes in the planning approval processes for major commercial development in the Sydney Central Business District (CBD). Concentrating on the past decade, it aims to examine the changing economic structure of the CBD, linking the changing form of the city to evolving design policies. It seeks to recover the experiences of participants in the development approval process and communicate instructive stories of the complex intersection between market forces and design regimens.Read moreRead less
Environmental Justice and the Making of Just Food and Energy Policy. This project aims to improve two key areas of environmental policy by investigating the meaning of environmental justice and how it is best implemented. It will generate a significant new framework of the idea of environmental justice and offer innovative research that demonstrates what hinders and enables just policies in practice. Expected outcomes of this project include an updated and enhanced theory of environmental justic ....Environmental Justice and the Making of Just Food and Energy Policy. This project aims to improve two key areas of environmental policy by investigating the meaning of environmental justice and how it is best implemented. It will generate a significant new framework of the idea of environmental justice and offer innovative research that demonstrates what hinders and enables just policies in practice. Expected outcomes of this project include an updated and enhanced theory of environmental justice, a new understanding of the enablers and barriers to its implementation in practice, and recommendations to make policies on urban food security and energy transition more just. Overall, the project should provide the benefit of the development of more just policies on two key environmental issues facing Australia.Read moreRead less
Assessing the national productivity impacts of chronic ill health. The project aims to address one of the biggest gaps in health and productivity research by designing a novel composite national metric that will rank lost productivity due to chronic illness The project brings together tax/transfer modelling, health modelling and epidemiological modelling specialists to develop a highly innovative microsimulation model: Health&WorkMOD to then quantify the costs of health-related productivity loss ....Assessing the national productivity impacts of chronic ill health. The project aims to address one of the biggest gaps in health and productivity research by designing a novel composite national metric that will rank lost productivity due to chronic illness The project brings together tax/transfer modelling, health modelling and epidemiological modelling specialists to develop a highly innovative microsimulation model: Health&WorkMOD to then quantify the costs of health-related productivity loss. The proposed model, an international first, will be a powerful tool to comprehensively model the cost impacts of illness and simulate policy options related to health and productivity. This will provide answers to critical policy questions for government with potential significant economic benefits.Read moreRead less
Towards an enhanced understanding of child and youth social exclusion risk at a small area level in Australia. This project will produce major national benefits, improving our understanding of child and youth social exclusion risk at a small area level, and putting Australia at the forefront of research into child well-being. Communities will benefit from the availability of high quality, rigorously developed measures of child and youth disadvantage at a local area level. Results from this proje ....Towards an enhanced understanding of child and youth social exclusion risk at a small area level in Australia. This project will produce major national benefits, improving our understanding of child and youth social exclusion risk at a small area level, and putting Australia at the forefront of research into child well-being. Communities will benefit from the availability of high quality, rigorously developed measures of child and youth disadvantage at a local area level. Results from this project will provided policy makers with tools to develop measures for overcoming disadvantage and narrowing gaps in outcomes for Australia's young people. The international team will ensure that methodological developments will be widely available in other countries interested in developing small area measures of child and youth disadvantage.Read moreRead less
Economic growth and globalisation: identifying costs and benefits. Globalisation provides opportunities to stimulate economic development and growth, but it may also impose costs on national economies. This project will utilise economic theory and econometric analysis to identify the principal sources and the magnitude of such benefits and costs. It will focus on three areas: trade in consumer goods; trade in capital goods; and the importation of knowledge and technology. The results will in ....Economic growth and globalisation: identifying costs and benefits. Globalisation provides opportunities to stimulate economic development and growth, but it may also impose costs on national economies. This project will utilise economic theory and econometric analysis to identify the principal sources and the magnitude of such benefits and costs. It will focus on three areas: trade in consumer goods; trade in capital goods; and the importation of knowledge and technology. The results will inform national policy-making in the areas of trade policy, industry policy, education and R&D.Read moreRead less