Estimating community benefits from tourism: The case of Carpentaria Shire

The small rural communities in Australia's tropical savanna landscapes depend upon the region's natural resources for income and employment. Historically primary industries - including mining, grazing and, in the case of coastal communities, fishing - have been the pillars of economic activity in those regions. More recently, tourism has emerged as an additional nature-based industry, which offers new development and employment opportunities for populations in remote regions. Net benefits from tourism accrue from the balance of economic, social and environmental interactions of tourists with a destination. This paper presents a model of tourism impact in the Carpentaria shire of North West Queensland. A methodology is developed for tracking and quantifying social, economic and environmental impacts. Data from an in-progress research project are presented and analysed to test the hypothesis that community benefits could be improved without an increase in visitor numbers, by changing the composition of visitors to the region. Interpretations are offered as to how both, sectorial and regional planning and management can effect improved community benefits from tourism.tourism impact, net benefit, savanna regions, destination management, host community, grey nomads, Environmental Economics and Policy, Marketing,

The importance of social learning for non-market valuation

Neoclassical valuation methods often measure the contribution that non-market goods make to utility as income compensations. This circumvents Arrow's impossibility (AI) –a theoretical proof establishing the impossibility of social preferences – but those methods cannot be used in all settings. We build on Arrow's original proof,showing that with two additional axioms that allow for social learning, a second round of preference elicitation with a social announcement after the first, generates logically consistent social preferences. In short: deliberation leads to convergence. A ‘web-game’ aligning with this is trialed to select real world projects, in a deliberative way, with the board of an Australian Aboriginal Corporation. Analysis of the data collected in the trial validates our theory; our test for convergence is statistically significant at the 1% level. Our results also suggest complex social goods are relatively undervalued without deliberation. Most non-market valuation methods could be easily adapted to facilitate social learnin

The travel cost method: an empirical investigation of Randall's difficulty

Randall (1994) argued that the Travel Cost Method, TCM, cannot do what it is supposed to do - generate monetary measures of recreation site benefits for use in Cost Benefit Analysis. Randall argues that what is relevant to recreational decision making is the subjective, and unobservable, price of travel, whereas what TCM uses is the observer assessed cost of travel. Hence, the best that can be expected from TCM is ordinally measurable welfare estimates. This paper formulates ‘Randall’s difficulty’ as an estimation problem and derives some results for that problem. A survey data set and Monte Carlo simulations based upon it, where many of the problems usually attending TCM application are absent, are used to illustrate and quantify Randall’s difficulty. The meaning of, prospects for, and usefulness of ordinal measurement are explored, and the question of the existence of a solution to Randall’s difficulty is considered

‘Research to ‘make a difference’ with Traditional Owners in the Martuwarra/Fitzroy River Catchment’

In 2015-16, NESP Northern Australia Environmental Resources Hub worked with Traditional Owners in the Kimberley region to identify their research priorities. While the projects will conclude in 2021, here we present some results from three projects identified as important. In the first project, the “Showing and sharing knowledge in the Fitzroy River Catchment”, ten Traditional Owner groups used participatory mapping tools to share traditional knowledge and learn from western scientific and political knowledge together. They reported feeling empowered to use these knowledges to inform conservation and development decisions on Country. In the second project, “Indigenous land, sea & water management” Emile and Celia Boxer helped conduct interviews and run workshops with four language groups to learn more about how these programs did (and did not) benefit Traditional Owners in the Fitzroy River Catchment. In the third project focusing on “Indigenous water values”, we worked together with collaborators from eight language groups in the Martuwarra/Fitzroy River catchment to understand the significance of water for Traditional Owners. Here we highlight the links between water and ethics in Traditional Owners’ relationships with their Country and present collaborative work with Nyikina women Annie Milgin, Linda Nardea and Hilda Grey. What these projects have in common is they involve local people contributing to their ecosystem and lifestyles – that is looking after their own people, economy and natural environment within their own ‘backyards’

New methods for valuing, and for identifying spatial variations, in cultural services: a case study of the Great Barrier Reef

Estimating values for ecosystem services (ES) can contribute to the decision making process, reducing the risk that ES benefits are overlooked. For ES with no (direct or indirect) links to markets, valuation is a non-trivial exercise. Traditional methods require the use of hypothetical markets; the life satisfaction (LS) approach does not. LS has previously been used to estimate the value of regulating ES, but to the best of our knowledge has never been used to estimate the value of cultural services (CS). We examine the relationship between LS and a subset of CS provided by the Great Barrier Reef (GBR), (the non-use CS), using geographically weighted regression to investigate spatial variations in value. After controlling for other factors, we find income is more important to LS in the south than the north; the opposite is true for non-use CS. The coefficients are used to estimate the amount of income required to keep overall LS constant, should the non-use CS of the GBR not be preserved, estimated at $8.7 bn annually. We acknowledge the imperfections of our work, noting the need for research on better CS measures, but feel that the general approach may add another useful tool to the valuation toolbox

The impact of economic, social and environmental factors on trip satisfaction and the likelihood of visitors returning

Tourism is vital to the economy of many regions; however visitor numbers in some are stagnating. Using a novel approach, this case study of the Great Barrier Reef explores and quantifies risks to visitor numbers, utilising tourist survey data supplemented by objective data from secondary sources. Economic, social and environmental factors affecting trip satisfaction are identified, which itself is found to affect the likelihood of a tourist returning; the impact of changes on trip satisfaction and on repeat visits is then estimated. Linkages between tourism and other industries are clearly demonstrated; increased construction work, decreased water clarity and decreased perceptions of tourist safety are all estimated to significantly reduce likelihood of repeat visits and hence impact tourist revenues, placing the financial viability of the industry at risk. Future development within the region should be evaluated holistically, rather than industries such as tourism, construction, agriculture etc. each being developed in isolation

Resident perceptions of the relative importance of socio-cultural, biodiversity, and commercial values in Australia\u27s Tropical Rivers - Report for the North Australia Water Futures Assessment<br />

EXECUTIVE SUMMARYBackground and overview of project (chapter 1):This report describes research that was commissioned by the Northern Australia Water Futures Assessment (NAWFA) Cultural and Social program. The NAWFA Cultural and Social program has funded a number of research projects to help fill some of the critical information gaps about Social and Cultural values associated with Australia&rsquo;s Northern Rivers.The TRaCK NAWFA Social and Cultural project was comprised of three research activities that were carried out by CSIRO, Charles Darwin University (CDU), James Cook University (JCU) and Griffith University (GU) as part of the Tropical Rivers and Coastal Knowledge (TRaCK) program. The three activities ran in parallel from March 2011 for a period of 12 months, and were:&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &bull; Sub-project 1 &ndash; Social and cultural values in the planning cycle (CSIRO and CDU);&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &bull; Sub-project 2 &ndash; Relative values of water for trade-offs (JCU); and&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &bull; Sub-project 3 &ndash; Developing management models for Indigenous water strategies (GU). This report relates to Sub-project 2 &ndash; Relative values of water for trade-offs.The overarching aim of this project was to improve our understanding of the Social and Cultural values associated with Australia&rsquo;s Tropical Rivers. Its specific objectives were to improve our understanding of:&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 1. the relative values of water for different stakeholder groups;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 2. the rate at which different stakeholder groups are willing to trade-off &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; economic development for those values;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 3. the extent to which stream flow and/or water quality could change before there was a &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &lsquo;significant&rsquo; impact on Social and Cultural values; and hence&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; 4. the likely response of stakeholders to the consequences of upstream development scenarios and &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; &nbsp; to potential changes in the downstream uses of water.The project was undertaken within a limited timeframe. Although data collection processes ensured that a reasonable cross section of views were obtained, these views are not considered to be&nbsp;&nbsp; representative of the views of all residents of Northern Australia. Furthermore, although researchers have been able to conduct a relatively detailed analysis of much of the data and&nbsp; produce useful results, there is scope for further, more sophisticated analysis that may generate further insights. As such, this work should be viewed as generating &lsquo;preliminary&rsquo; findings.Generic methods (chapter 2):A hammer is not capable of fixing all building problems. Likewise, no single valuation method can be used in all situations. One needs to consider a variety of different issues, including data availability, ethical and information requirements.Social and Cultural values are only loosely associated with the market (if at all). As such, many valuation techniques (particularly those which rely on observable market prices) could not be used to asses ALL values of interest. Instead, stated preference techniques were chosen since they alone are able to assess a full range of values (irrespective of whether or not they are associated with the market).However, researchers were aware of the fact that if they used stated preference techniques to measure preferences at an individual level by asking about Willingness to Pay (WTP), and if they then added those &lsquo;preferences&rsquo; across multiple individuals (each with a different income), they would create what is &ndash; in essence &ndash; a weighted index of value (where the weights are a function of income). Researchers therefore decided to use both dollar and non-dollar denominated stated preference techniques.Sampling (chapter 3):Researchers were cognizant of the fact that the work was commissioned by NAWFA, with the overarching goal of providing information (about Social and Cultural values) to assist water planners. These planners work, almost exclusively, with local residents. So, researchers decided to assess only the &lsquo;values&rsquo; of residents in the tropical river&rsquo;s region &ndash; although great care was taken to ensure that information was collected from a broad cross-section of those residents.A questionnaire was mailed out to more than 1500 residents across Northern Australia. Researchers received 252 usable responses, which were supplemented by interviews that were conducted with 39 residents of the Upper Mitchell River, QLD. The upper part of this catchment was chosen for an intensive case study for three reasons: (1) it is in the formative stages of water policy and planning, so a study such as this was well-timed to provide information that might assist those involved in the planning process; (2) Researchers needed to ensure that data were collected from both Indigenous and non-Indigenous residents, and they had already worked with several Indigenous people in and around the upper reaches of the Mitchell, making it relatively easy to engage with various groups in a short study period of time; and (3) development issues confronting those in the Mitchell Catchment are likely to precede those in other TR catchments (with the exception of regions in and around Darwin), meaning that lessons learned from this case-study could be useful in other regions in later years.The entire sample included a smaller percentage of Indigenous people, large families, young people and people who did not go to university, than the population from which the sample was drawn. The&nbsp; sample did, however, contain observations from a broad cross-section of most of our targeted&nbsp; &lsquo;stakeholder&rsquo; groups, namely residents who depend upon the agricultural, mining, government and &lsquo;other&rsquo; sectors for income and employment, allowing many important observations to be drawn.Readers are cautioned not to simply look at aggregate measures (e.g. means), and assume that those measures can be used to draw inferences about the population at large. Instead readers should first check to see if the variable of interest is &lsquo;consistent&rsquo; across stakeholder groups. Where differences exist, readers should look at the information most pertinent to the group(s) of interest, rather than at aggregate measures. If used in this way, the information generated in this report is likely to be very useful.Readers are, however, urged to exercise extreme caution when seeking to use insights from this study to draw inferences about Indigenous values in other parts of the TR region. This is because of the relatively low number of Indigenous responses received, and the fact that most Indigenous respondents came from one small area of the TR region. But readers should even be cautious about trying to draw inferences about the values of other Indigenous people within the study area; our Indigenous sample did not include people from ALL traditional owner groups in the Upper Mitchell.Objective 1 &ndash; (chapter 4):Researchers sought to assess the relative importance which a wide variety of residents of Northern Australia place upon nine different goods/services associated with Australia&rsquo;s Tropical Rivers, including the values associated with the &lsquo;use&rsquo; (consumptive or otherwise) of rivers for: supporting human life (referred to as Life); for supporting Biodiversity; for use in Commercial ventures; for future generations (termed Bequest); for simply &lsquo;being there&rsquo; even if never used (termed Existence); for recreational Fishing; for other types of Recreation; for Aesthetics; and for Teaching.Importantly, the list of values comprised six examples of Social and Cultural values, and three examples of other (non-Social/Cultural) values. These other values were included to enable researchers to gauge the importance of Social and Cultural values RELATIVE to other &lsquo;values&rsquo;.Respondents were presented with a list of those values and asked to indicate (i) how important each was to their overall well-being; and (ii) how satisfied they were with it. When not completely satisfied, they were asked to explain why. The data were analysed using several different approaches, clearly highlighting the following:&bull; In terms of importance, the top three values identified by respondents were Biodiversity,&nbsp; Life, and Bequest.&bull; The highest satisfaction ratings were associated with Biodiversity, while Life, Bequest and&nbsp; Aesthetics were equally second highest.&bull; Many of the stated causes of dissatisfaction related to concerns about what might happen in the &nbsp; future (rather than to concerns about what was happening now).&bull; Most stakeholder groups held similar views about the ranking of values (in terms of &lsquo;importance&rsquo;) &nbsp; from highest to lowest, although some socio-demographic, economic, and sense of place factors were &nbsp; found to have a minor influence on importance scores.&bull; One of the highest policy priorities seems to be that of Commercial values. This is not&nbsp; because such values were considered to be important (they were rarely in the &lsquo;top three&rsquo;), but &nbsp; because the satisfaction scores associated with these values were so low. Evidently, the issue here &nbsp; is not one of protecting Commercial values, but of addressing problems, and concerns relating to &nbsp; the commercial use of water. Resident concerns included, but were not limited to issues associated &nbsp; with: pollution (past, present, or potential future), pricing, overuse, lack of certainty in &nbsp; supply, allocation and lack of monitoring. Interestingly, there were no systematic or predictable &nbsp; differences in the responses of different stakeholder groups in either the satisfaction scores or &nbsp; the indices of dissatisfaction associated with Commercial values; evidently respondents were &nbsp; consistently &lsquo;dissatisfied&rsquo; with this value (although for many different reasons).A small subset of respondents (interviewees) were also asked to participate in a cognitive mapping exercise &ndash; the aim being to determine the extent to which the values assessed in the survey could be viewed as complementary or competitive. Biodiversity, Life and Social/Cultural values were viewed as being largely complementary to each other. In contrast, Commercial values were consistently viewed as quite separate from &ndash; and often competitive or detrimental to &ndash; these other values (with the important exception of tourism).Objective 2 (chapter 5):Respondents were also presented with a series of (hypothetical) development &lsquo;scenarios&rsquo;. First, they were asked to indicate how much they would be willing to pay (WTP) to prevent development that would impact upon Social and Cultural values. Then they were asked to indicate how much they would be willing to accept (WTA) as compensation if development caused damage to their Social and Cultural values. Finally they were asked how much they would be willing to pay to reduce current&nbsp; development, thus increasing their opportunity to enjoy Social and Cultural values.Data were analysed using a variety of different methods, highlighting the following:1) A large proportion of respondents were strongly opposed to the development scenarios, &nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; evidenced by the fact that&nbsp;- Fewer than 33 per cent of respondents indicated that they approved of the development scenarios &nbsp;&nbsp; presented in the first two scenarios &ndash; even when the impact on Social and Cultural values was &nbsp;&nbsp; relatively small.- A relatively large percentage of respondents refused to consider any trade-off at all (between &nbsp; 30% and 70%, depending upon the format of questionnaire presented).- Some respondents noted that they had already spent thousands of dollars fighting development &nbsp; proposals in and around &lsquo;their&rsquo; rivers.- Of the group that agreed to &lsquo;play&rsquo; the trade-off &lsquo;game&rsquo;, approximately 5 per cent were WTP/A &nbsp; significant sums of money to avoid damage or to &lsquo;repair&rsquo; damage to their Social and Cultural &nbsp; values) with maximum values cited in the survey of $1 million and many values in excess of$10,000. &nbsp; These maximum values generated highly skewed distributions with mean WTP/A ranging between almost &nbsp; $6000 per annum per household, to almost$28,000; median values were much more modest (between 15   and 100).- More than 50 per cent of respondents indicated that they would be willing to accept a DECLINE in income if it was associated&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; with improved opportunities to enjoy their Social and Cultural values.This strong sentiment is not altogether surprising given the fact that the previous chapter clearly showed that Commercial values were, almost always, rated as being less important than some Social and Cultural values &ndash; particularly Bequest. Moreover, it is consistent with previous studies in the region (e.g. Straton and Zander, 2010).This strong sentiment may also at least partially reflect an assumption on the part of respondents that the scenarios would affect more than just Social and Cultural values (i.e. they may be assuming that the development will also impact values such as Biodiversity which are viewed by some as essentially inseparable from Social and Cultural values).2) When outliers (i.e. the very high WTP/A dollar votes) were excluded, researchers found that:- WTP was strongly linked to ability to pay, but that those on low incomes are willing to sacrifice &nbsp; a much higher proportion of their income to protect their rivers than those on high incomes (three &nbsp; to four times higher). This is also consistent with previous findings of Straton and Zander (2010).- The importance which people place on Biodiversity is, almost always, a positive and statistically &nbsp; significant determinant of their WTP to protect Social and Cultural values (reinforcing earlier &nbsp; observations about the complementarity of these values).- People&rsquo;s expressed willingness to accept compensation for &lsquo;damage&rsquo; to Social and Cultural &nbsp; values (which they are unable to prevent from occurring) is significantly higher than their &nbsp; expressed willingness to pay to avoid the damage from occurring in the first place. The potential &nbsp; policy significance of this is discussed in chapter 7 (summarised under issue 3, page vi).Objective 3 (chapter 6):Respondents were asked to consider a range of hypothetical scenarios that involved changes to stream flows and water quality in nearby rivers. Specifically, they were asked to indicate (on a five point Likert scale) how these changes would affect their satisfaction with Social and Cultural values. Analysis of the data highlighted the following issues:&bull; Any change which stops the flow of perennial rivers &ndash; even if only for a month or two &ndash; is likely &nbsp; to have a significant, negative impact on Social and Cultural values. (The term significant &nbsp; indicates that more than 50% of respondents said that such a change would either reduce or greatly &nbsp; reduce their satisfaction.)&bull; Respondents were generally positive or ambivalent about changes in stream flow which reduced dry &nbsp; periods. In other words, those who live near an intermittent river system stated that they would &nbsp; either have increased or consistent levels of satisfaction with their Social and Cultural values if &nbsp; the dry periods were shortened (or if the river becomes perennial). The important exception to this &nbsp; occurred with respect to perennial but UNPREDICTABLE flows. Perennial flows are viewed positively &ndash; &nbsp; as long as the flows are constant, or related to natural, seasonal fluctuations.&bull; Scenarios that reduce water quality (be it due to increased levels of turbidity or algae) are &nbsp; likely to create a significant negative impact on Social and Cultural values; improvements are &nbsp; likely to generate a significant positive impact.&bull; Respondents viewed reductions in water quality more negatively than reductions in stream flow, &nbsp; and were consistently more positive about scenarios that involved improvements in water quality &nbsp; than about scenarios that involved increases in stream flow. This may be at least partially due to &nbsp; the fact that respondents are used to living in regions that have extremely variable climates. &nbsp; Changes to stream flows may thus be considered somewhat &lsquo;normal&rsquo;.Concluding remarks and recommendations (Chapter 7):Objective 4 asked researchers to determine:What is the likely response of stakeholders to consequences of upstream development scenarios and to potential changes in the downstream usages of water?Chapter 4 clearly showed that Commercial values are considered to be less important than&nbsp; Biodiversity, Life and some Social/Cultural values, while chapter 5 clearly showed that at least some people are WTP substantial amounts of money to prevent development that impacts upon their&nbsp; Social/Cultural values. As such, it seems that developments which impact upon downstream usages of water are likely to be met with quite a negative reaction.The opposition is likely to be characterised by significant disquiet amongst a possibly vocal minority (those refusing to consider any trade off at all, or WTP very large sums of money to prevent the development from occurring) and a present, but less significant disquiet amongst a larger group of other residents.Those most willing to accept trade-offs for development include the wealthy and/or people who place highest values on Commercial uses of rivers; those who place a high value on Biodiversity (a significant proportion of respondents) and/or those who are relatively poor seem to be much less willing to trade their Social and Cultural values for greater income flows.Other important comments/insightsISSUE 1: Interviewee data indicates that Biodiversity, Life and Social/Cultural values are somewhat&nbsp; complementary to each other, whereas, Commercial values are almost always viewed as quite separate from &ndash; and often competitive or detrimental to &ndash; these other values (with the important exception of tourism). Moreover the larger (mail out) data set showed a strong correlation between WTP to protect Social/Cultural values and stated importance of Biodiversity values.Evidently, for many Northern Residents, the existence of biodiversity may be a necessary pre-condition for maintenance of many Social and Cultural values. Determining whether or not the existence of biodiversity is also a SUFFICIENT condition for the preservation of Social and Cultural values, stands as a vitally important topic for further, more thorough, research. Why is this so important?&bull; If the existence of high quality biodiversity values is both a necessary and sufficient condition &nbsp; for the existence of high quality socio-cultural values, then preservation of the former &nbsp; guarantees preservation of the latter. However, if the existence of high quality biodiversity &nbsp; values is a necessary, but not a sufficient condition for the existence of high quality socio- &nbsp; cultural values, then preservation of the former does not guarantee preservation of the later; &nbsp; other steps may be necessary (e.g. guaranteeing access to areas of high biodiversity value).&bull; Moreover, if the Biodiversity and Social/Cultural values that are derived from one &lsquo;area&rsquo; are &nbsp; non-rivalrous (meaning that society can benefit from both, simultaneously), then their values &nbsp; should be added together1 before being traded off against other competing uses of that &lsquo;area&rsquo;. This &nbsp; is analogous to the situation where a private property owner seeks to determine how much land to &nbsp; devote to cattle and how much to wheat: he/she should firstly estimate the value of &lsquo;cattle&rsquo; by &nbsp; considering potential income from both beef and leather, and then compare that (combined) value to &nbsp; the potential income that can be earned from the alternative (wheat). Failure to do so, would be to &nbsp; under-allocate resources (e.g. land, or in this case, possibly aquatic resources) to activities &nbsp; that generate multiple values (e.g. cattle, or in this case, possibly biodiversity and &nbsp; socio-cultural values).Until we are able to learn more about these important issues2, planners may, therefore, wish to adopt a pre-cautionary approach (as advocated by the NWI). That is, they may wish to proceed as if these values are non-rivalrous, perhaps setting aside MOREthan the &lsquo;bare minimum&rsquo; that is required to maintain biodiversity values, and also ensuring that other steps are taken to facilitate the appreciation of socio-cultural values (e.g. ensuring residents have access to important areas).ISSUE 2: Respondents were particularly concerned about changes which impact upon water quality, although those who live near perennial rivers were also very concerned about any change that would stop their stream/river flowing for even a short period each year. Moreover, comments made during focus groups and in interviews (as well as comments written on returned, mail-out questionaries) indicated that (a) many respondents have a holistic view of their environment (incorporating&nbsp; social, cultural, economic and biophysical values); (b) they did not feel as if all local environmental management issues were being dealt with effectively; and that (c) their oppositio

The significance of environmental values for destination competitiveness and sustainable tourism strategy making: insights from Australia's Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area

Sustainable destinations must deliver products that perform better than their competitors and at the same time protect key environmental drawcards. This research explores the environmental–economic interface of a major destination, both as a case study in how to approach this complex relationship and as a contribution to the methodology of tackling the need for understanding competitive pressures as part of sustainable tourism strategy creation. Using the Great Barrier Reef World Heritage Area (GBRWHA) as an example, the paper assesses 21 key environmental values, including Indigenous culture, against market-based factors, in terms of their importance for visitors as regional drawcards, satisfaction with them and the way in which changes in them might affect trip numbers and duration across different regions. While the natural values of the GBRWHA are found to be the most important drawcards, satisfaction scores were significantly lower than importance scores for a number of these values. Visitors responded more negatively to the prospect of environmental degradation than to the prospect of a 20% increase in local prices: the detailed impact depends, however, on location and visitor mix. Clear ocean, healthy coral reefs, healthy reef fish, and lack of rubbish were the top four most important values

Economic values and Indigenous Protected Areas across Northern Australia. Final report

We undertook a systematic review of the empirical valuation literature relating to benefits associated with Indigenous protected Areas (IPAs), revealing that some benefits are quantified in monetary terms more frequently than others, both in Australia and elsewhere. This does not mean that the quantified benefits are more important than other benefits. Instead it indicates that they are easier to quantify. As a result, there are substantive gaps in our understanding of numerous benefits – of their value to different people, in different contexts, in their entirety, and relative to other benefits (Section 5). Our research indicated that while a lack of price does not mean lack of value, it often means lack of ‘visibility’ or ‘presence’. So, vitally important non-market goods and services associated with IPAs may be overlooked, particularly by decision-makers who are driven by quantitative and/or economic data. It is important to find ways of highlighting the importance of those non-market benefits, so that resources can be directed in a manner that generates most benefit per dollar spent

Multiple co-benefits of Indigenous land and sea management programs across northern Australia: final report

Our aim is to generate information that can be used to help design, monitor, and/or select ILSMPs to help meet the goals of key stakeholders. We focus on goals above and beyond environmental goals – i.e. those that can be considered to be co-benefits. These diverse goals include seeking to enhance individual wellbeing, help communities meet their aspirations, support the development of Indigenous businesses and/or promote regional economic development. When determining what an ‘Indigenous land and sea management program’ is, we visualise a Venn diagram with intersecting sets. • Set one: There are innumerable traditional Indigenous land and sea management activities or practices that have been going on for tens of thousands of years – these include, but are not limited to getting out on country, looking after waterholes, hunting and burning (Section 2.1.1). • Set two: Government and non-government organisations fund a variety of different programs, some of which support Indigenous people and some of which support land management (Section 2.1.2). Not all land mangagement programs facilitate Indigenous practices, and not all Indigenous programs facilitate land management. For the purposes of this project, we focus on the intersection of those two sets, defining an ILSMP as a program that funds or supports traditional Indigenous land management activities