Improving Sub-national Population Forecasts. The aim of this project is to make significant advances in two related areas of regional, council area and local population forecasting, namely improving accuracy, and providing an indication of forecast uncertainty. Population forecasts often turn out to be far more inaccurate than users realise and fail to come with any information about reliability. Every year forecasts inform a wide variety of planning and policy development activities and influen ....Improving Sub-national Population Forecasts. The aim of this project is to make significant advances in two related areas of regional, council area and local population forecasting, namely improving accuracy, and providing an indication of forecast uncertainty. Population forecasts often turn out to be far more inaccurate than users realise and fail to come with any information about reliability. Every year forecasts inform a wide variety of planning and policy development activities and influence investment decisions worth billions of dollars. In order to increase the value of forecasts to users, this project aims to combine methods from a range of disciplines to devise more accurate ways of forecasting populations, and provide accompanying information on their likely error.Read moreRead less
Gambling-related harm in Northern Australia: A Geographic Information Systems (GIS)-based spatiotemporal analysis of venue catchments. There is growing national concern about the impact of electronic gaming (poker) machines yet little is known about the effects of this gambling in rural and remote areas of Australia. We will develop a database to define the geographic distribution of gambling impacts, the nature of high-risk venues, and the characteristics, both spatial and social, of vulnerable ....Gambling-related harm in Northern Australia: A Geographic Information Systems (GIS)-based spatiotemporal analysis of venue catchments. There is growing national concern about the impact of electronic gaming (poker) machines yet little is known about the effects of this gambling in rural and remote areas of Australia. We will develop a database to define the geographic distribution of gambling impacts, the nature of high-risk venues, and the characteristics, both spatial and social, of vulnerable communities. This will enable the design of much needed harm minimisation strategies and will provide regulatory bodies with insights into the capacity of local communities to absorb the impact of electronic gaming machine venues.Read moreRead less
Causes and consequences of population turnover in the Northern Territory. The Northern Territory experiences an extraordinarily high rate of population turnover. Approximately one quarter (compared to less than 10% for most other states) of the Territory's resident population in 2001 had lived somewhere else 5 years earlier. The research will examine the characteristics and causes of this turnover as well as its long-term implications for the composition and associated planning capacity of the N ....Causes and consequences of population turnover in the Northern Territory. The Northern Territory experiences an extraordinarily high rate of population turnover. Approximately one quarter (compared to less than 10% for most other states) of the Territory's resident population in 2001 had lived somewhere else 5 years earlier. The research will examine the characteristics and causes of this turnover as well as its long-term implications for the composition and associated planning capacity of the NT population. Of particular interest is the effect of population transience on the establishment, maintenance, and continuation of knowledge systems, both desert and tropical.Read moreRead less
Developing Robust Small Area Population Forecasts for Planning and Policy. This project aims to create more robust, detailed, and accurate small area population forecasts, and implement them in a sophisticated forecasting system for one jurisdiction in Australia, USA, UK and Canada. The project is significant as it expects to generate a suite of new and innovative methods, theory, and population forecasts that will be useful to researchers and planners both in Australia and overseas. Expected ou ....Developing Robust Small Area Population Forecasts for Planning and Policy. This project aims to create more robust, detailed, and accurate small area population forecasts, and implement them in a sophisticated forecasting system for one jurisdiction in Australia, USA, UK and Canada. The project is significant as it expects to generate a suite of new and innovative methods, theory, and population forecasts that will be useful to researchers and planners both in Australia and overseas. Expected outcomes include new forecasting methods, associated computer code, many open-access academic papers, and new international collaborations. More detailed and reliable population forecasts will bring substantial benefits to those planning our future infrastructure requirements (e.g. schools, hospitals, housing and transport).
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The demographic consequences of extreme weather events in Australia. This project aims to understand how extreme weather events are likely to affect Australians’ residential mobility choices, using machine learning techniques to provide the first overview of the impact of natural hazards on where Australians are likely to live in the future. Expected outcomes include an understanding of the influence of extreme weather events on changes in population numbers and composition. Expected benefits in ....The demographic consequences of extreme weather events in Australia. This project aims to understand how extreme weather events are likely to affect Australians’ residential mobility choices, using machine learning techniques to provide the first overview of the impact of natural hazards on where Australians are likely to live in the future. Expected outcomes include an understanding of the influence of extreme weather events on changes in population numbers and composition. Expected benefits include an understanding of how environmental drivers are influencing internal migration in Australia, enabling better planning for service provision and economic growth.Read moreRead less
Evaluating the impact of Indigenous preferential procurement programs. This project aims to conduct a multi-disciplinary, multi-method evaluation of the implementation and impacts of Indigenous preferential procurement programs (IPPPs) on Indigenous businesses, Indigenous communities, procurers’ operations and outcomes. Bringing together researchers in partnership with corporate and government procurers, Indigenous data custodians and the Australian Bureau of Statistics we aim to produce a signi ....Evaluating the impact of Indigenous preferential procurement programs. This project aims to conduct a multi-disciplinary, multi-method evaluation of the implementation and impacts of Indigenous preferential procurement programs (IPPPs) on Indigenous businesses, Indigenous communities, procurers’ operations and outcomes. Bringing together researchers in partnership with corporate and government procurers, Indigenous data custodians and the Australian Bureau of Statistics we aim to produce a significant national program evaluation of IPPPs and the impact at the community level. The project aims to highlight ways in which IPPPs can be [re]designed to reduce implementation friction, facilitate access and participation among Indigenous businesses and help guarantee positive effects on Indigenous communities.Read moreRead less
Modelling the Causes of Regional Disparities across Australia. This project aims to explain the changing patterns of regional economic performance across Australia between 2001-2011 in the context of two developments: major structural shifts in world trade and commodity prices spawning massive mining growth and negative exchange rate impacts elsewhere (for example, manufacturing); and the financial crisis ending the credit boom leaving east coast economies struggling. The resulting regional disp ....Modelling the Causes of Regional Disparities across Australia. This project aims to explain the changing patterns of regional economic performance across Australia between 2001-2011 in the context of two developments: major structural shifts in world trade and commodity prices spawning massive mining growth and negative exchange rate impacts elsewhere (for example, manufacturing); and the financial crisis ending the credit boom leaving east coast economies struggling. The resulting regional disparities have policy implications for education and skills training, housing affordability, infrastructure provision, and community sustainability. These issues will be investigated using a new functional economic regions geography and state of art spatial modelling tools supplemented by regional case studies.Read moreRead less
Improving the Governance of Species Lists. The aim of this project is to develop a system of governance for the creation of taxonomic lists. This project expects to apply knowledge of how other science organizations govern themselves to the governance of taxonomic lists, estimate the costs of current inefficiencies and identify impediments to improvement. Expected outcomes of this project include a process for validating global lists of species. This should provide significant benefits, such as ....Improving the Governance of Species Lists. The aim of this project is to develop a system of governance for the creation of taxonomic lists. This project expects to apply knowledge of how other science organizations govern themselves to the governance of taxonomic lists, estimate the costs of current inefficiencies and identify impediments to improvement. Expected outcomes of this project include a process for validating global lists of species. This should provide significant benefits, such as single lists of species that can be adopted at any scale and are readily comparable across countries and applications. A single list will ensure threatened species and those of quarantine or health concern don’t fall through the cracks and cause problems.Read moreRead less
Securing the essential: assisting Indigenous communities and their service providers to sustainably manage water and energy supply. The provision of water and energy supplies to remote Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander (ATSI) communities is a critical challenge for service providers. This project uses a novel unobtrusive smart metering system, aligned with culturally appropriate consultation with ATSI communities, to reveal patterns of household water and water related-energy consumption. Si ....Securing the essential: assisting Indigenous communities and their service providers to sustainably manage water and energy supply. The provision of water and energy supplies to remote Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander (ATSI) communities is a critical challenge for service providers. This project uses a novel unobtrusive smart metering system, aligned with culturally appropriate consultation with ATSI communities, to reveal patterns of household water and water related-energy consumption. Significantly, the research aims to identify effective behavioural and technological water and energy efficiency strategies in three remote ATSI communities in Queensland, Northern Territory and Western Australia. A key outcome is to provide an adaptive evidence-based and community-driven handbook to facilitate the secure long-term supply and efficient use of energy and water resources in remote ATSI communities.Read moreRead less
Bringing back Australia's lost woodland biodiversity: towards strategic multi-species reintroductions. Australia has the highest rate of mammal extinction of any continent on the planet. This has reduced biodiversity and compromised many important ecological processes. What is the best way to re-build depauperate mammal communities with multi-species reintroductions? What effects do multi-species reintroductions have on recipient ecosystems? This project aims to explore these questions by reintr ....Bringing back Australia's lost woodland biodiversity: towards strategic multi-species reintroductions. Australia has the highest rate of mammal extinction of any continent on the planet. This has reduced biodiversity and compromised many important ecological processes. What is the best way to re-build depauperate mammal communities with multi-species reintroductions? What effects do multi-species reintroductions have on recipient ecosystems? This project aims to explore these questions by reintroducing three mammal species to a critically endangered temperate woodland: a carnivore (the eastern quoll), an insectivore (yellow-footed antechinus), and a herbivore (the eastern chestnut mouse). Results from this sequenced multi-species reintroduction experiment will have broad applicability to ecosystem restoration in Australia and overseas.Read moreRead less