IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ags/prodwp/31906.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Precaution: principles and practice in Australian environmental and natural resource management

Author

Listed:
  • Peterson, Deborah C.

Abstract

Precaution : principles and practice in Australian environmental and natural resource management by Deborah Peterson, was presented as the Presidential Address to the 50th Annual Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society Conference, Manly, New South Wales, 8 - 10 February 2006. Since the late 1980s, the concept of precaution has been incorporated into numerous international agreements and laws, as well as in domestic statutes and policies in many countries. This paper examines the international emergence of the concept and its application in Australia. Despite rapid growth in adoption of the so-called "precautionary principle," the concept remains highly controversial, and its success in terms of improving environmental and natural resource management has been questioned. This paper argues that implementation guidelines are essential to ensure that precautionary decision making is consistent with good decision making principles, and to avoid unnecessary costs and the potential for perverse outcomes. Economists have an important role in contributing to these guidelines and in developing techniques for incorporating uncertainty into decision making. The views expressed in this paper do not necessarily reflect those of the Australian Government or the Productivity Commission.

Suggested Citation

  • Peterson, Deborah C., 2006. "Precaution: principles and practice in Australian environmental and natural resource management," Conference Workshop Proceedings 31906, Productivity Commission.
    • Handle: RePEc:ags:prodwp:31906
    DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.31906
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/31906/files/cp06pe01.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.22004/ag.econ.31906?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. repec:reg:rpubli:201 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Francesco Sindico, 2005. "The GMO Dispute before the WTO: Legal Implications for the Trade and Environment Debate," Working Papers 2005.11, Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei.
    3. Sumaila, Ussif R. & Walters, Carl, 2005. "Intergenerational discounting: a new intuitive approach," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(2), pages 135-142, January.
    4. Quiggin, John, 2005. "The Precautionary Principle in Environmental Policy and the Theory of Choice under Uncertainty," Risk and Sustainable Management Group Working Papers 149847, University of Queensland, School of Economics.
    5. Bennett, Jeffrey W., 2005. "Australasian environmental economics: contributions, conflicts and ‘cop-outs’," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 49(3), pages 1-19.
    6. Giandomenico Majone, 2002. "The Precautionary Principle and its Policy Implications," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 40(1), pages 89-109, March.
    7. Ian Wills, 1997. "The Environment, Information and the Precautionary Principle," Agenda - A Journal of Policy Analysis and Reform, Australian National University, College of Business and Economics, School of Economics, vol. 4(1), pages 51-62.
    8. Dorman, Peter, 2005. "Evolving knowledge and the precautionary principle," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 53(2), pages 169-176, April.
    9. Gollier, Christian & Treich, Nicolas, 2003. "Decision-Making under Scientific Uncertainty: The Economics of the Precautionary Principle," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 27(1), pages 77-103, August.
    10. Pindyck, Robert S., 2000. "Irreversibilities and the timing of environmental policy," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 22(3), pages 233-259, July.
    11. van den Bergh, Jeroen C. J. M., 2004. "Optimal climate policy is a utopia: from quantitative to qualitative cost-benefit analysis," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(4), pages 385-393, April.
    12. Sunstein Cass R., 2005. "The Precautionary Principle as a Basis for Decision Making," The Economists' Voice, De Gruyter, vol. 2(2), pages 1-10, April.
    13. Macauley, Molly, 2005. "The Value of Information: A Background Paper on Measuring the Contribution of Space-Derived Earth Science Data to National Resource Management," RFF Working Paper Series dp-05-26, Resources for the Future.
    14. Nicolas Treich, 2001. "What is the Economic Meaning of the Precautionary Principle?," The Geneva Papers on Risk and Insurance - Issues and Practice, Palgrave Macmillan;The Geneva Association, vol. 26(3), pages 334-345, July.
    15. Ragnar E. L–fstedt, 2004. "The Swing of the Regulatory Pendulum in Europe: From Precautionary Principle to (Regulatory) Impact Analysis," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 28(3), pages 237-260, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Deborah C. Peterson, 2006. "Precaution: principles and practice in Australian environmental and natural resource management ," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 50(4), pages 469-489, December.
    2. Baker, Rick & Ruting, Brad, 2014. "Environmental Policy Analysis: A Guide to Non‑Market Valuation," 2014 Conference (58th), February 4-7, 2014, Port Macquarie, Australia 165810, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society.
    3. Holzer, Jorge & Olson, Lars J., 2021. "Precautionary buffers and stochastic dependence in environmental policy," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 106(C).
    4. Peterson, Deborah C., 2006. "Precaution: principles and practice in Australian environmental and natural resource management," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 50(4), pages 1-21, December.
    5. Annette Weier & Paul Loke, 2007. "Precaution and the Precautionary Principle: two Australian case studies," Staff Working Papers 0705, Productivity Commission, Government of Australia.
    6. Randall, Alan, 2009. "We Already Have Risk Management - Do We Really Need the Precautionary Principle?," International Review of Environmental and Resource Economics, now publishers, vol. 3(1), pages 39-74, August.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Peterson, Deborah C., 2006. "Precaution: principles and practice in Australian environmental and natural resource management," 2006 Conference (50th), February 8-10, 2006, Sydney, Australia 137764, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society.
    2. Kjell Hausken, 2019. "Principal–Agent Theory, Game Theory, and the Precautionary Principle," Decision Analysis, INFORMS, vol. 16(2), pages 105-127, June.
    3. Peterson, Deborah C., 2006. "Precaution: principles and practice in Australian environmental and natural resource management," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 50(4), pages 1-21, December.
    4. Annette Weier & Paul Loke, 2007. "Precaution and the Precautionary Principle: two Australian case studies," Staff Working Papers 0705, Productivity Commission, Government of Australia.
    5. Clarke Harry, 2008. "Classical decision rules and adaptation to climate change ," Australian Journal of Agricultural and Resource Economics, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, vol. 52(4), pages 487-504, December.
    6. GROSSE Olivier & SEVI Benoît, 2005. "Dérégulation et R&D dans le secteur énergétique européen," Cahiers du CREDEN (CREDEN Working Papers) 05.07.59, CREDEN (Centre de Recherche en Economie et Droit de l'Energie), Faculty of Economics, University of Montpellier 1.
    7. Jeroen Bergh, 2007. "Evolutionary thinking in environmental economics," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 17(5), pages 521-549, October.
    8. W. Botzen & Jeroen Bergh, 2014. "Specifications of Social Welfare in Economic Studies of Climate Policy: Overview of Criteria and Related Policy Insights," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 58(1), pages 1-33, May.
    9. Turvey, Calum G. & Mojduszka, Eliza M., 2005. "The Precautionary Principle and the law of unintended consequences," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 30(2), pages 145-161, April.
    10. Helen Scarborough & Jeff Bennett, 2012. "Cost–Benefit Analysis and Distributional Preferences," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 14376.
    11. Heyen, Daniel & Goeschl, Timo & Wiesenfarth , Boris, 2015. "Risk Assessment under Ambiguity: Precautionary Learning vs. Research Pessimism," Working Papers 0605, University of Heidelberg, Department of Economics.
    12. Macauley, Molly, 2006. "Some Issues at the Forefront of Public Policy for Environmental Risk," RFF Working Paper Series dp-06-01, Resources for the Future.
    13. Nabil I. Al-Najjar, 2015. "A Bayesian Framework for the Precautionary Principle," The Journal of Legal Studies, University of Chicago Press, vol. 44(S2), pages 337-365.
    14. Marcello Basili & Mauriziop Franzini, 2005. "The Avian Flu Disease: A Case of Precautionary Failure," Department of Economics University of Siena 454, Department of Economics, University of Siena.
    15. Marcello Basili & Maurizio Franzini, 2006. "Understanding the Risk of an Avian Flu Pandemic: Rational Waiting or Precautionary Failure?," Risk Analysis, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 26(3), pages 617-630, June.
    16. van den Bergh, J.C.J.M. & Botzen, W.J.W., 2015. "Monetary valuation of the social cost of CO2 emissions: A critical survey," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 33-46.
    17. Crase, Lin & Gillespie, Rob, 2006. "A Preliminary Consideration of Use and Non-Use Values Circumscribing the Lake Hume Water and Foreshore Management Plan," 2006 Conference (50th), February 8-10, 2006, Sydney, Australia 174471, Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society.
    18. Harin, Alexander, 2006. "Scientific Revolution? A Farewell to EconWPA. MPRA is welcome," MPRA Paper 71, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    19. LOFGREN Asa & MILLOCK Katrin & NAUGES Céline, 2007. "Using Ex Post Data to Estimate the Hurdle Rate of Abatement Investments - An application to the Swedish Pulp and Paper Industry and Energy Sector," LERNA Working Papers 07.06.227, LERNA, University of Toulouse.
    20. Attanasi, Giuseppe Marco & Montesano, Aldo, 2010. "Testing Value vs Waiting Value in Environmental Decisions under Uncertainty," TSE Working Papers 10-154, Toulouse School of Economics (TSE).

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Resource /Energy Economics and Policy;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ags:prodwp:31906. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: AgEcon Search (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/pcgovau.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.