Where and when to revegetate : a quantitative method for scheduling landscape reconstruction

Restoration of native vegetation is required in many regions of the world, but determining priority locations for revegetation is a complex problem. We consider the problem of determining spatial and temporal priorities for revegetation to maximize habitat for 62 bird species within a heavily cleared agricultural region, 11 000 km2 in area. We show how a reserve-selection framework can be applied to a complex, large-scale restoration-planning problem to account for multi-species objectives and connectivity requirements at a spatial extent and resolution relevant to management. Our approach explicitly accounts for time lags in planting and development of habitat resources, which is intended to avoid future population bottlenecks caused by delayed provision of critical resources, such as tree hollows. We coupled species-specific models of expected habitat quality and fragmentation effects with the dynamics of habitat suitability following replanting to produce species-specific maps for future times. Spatial priorities for restoration were determined by ranking locations (150-m grid cells) by their expected contribution to species habitat through time using the conservation planning tool, ‘‘Zonation.’’ We evaluated solutions by calculating expected trajectories of habitat availability for each species. We produced a spatially explicit revegetation schedule for the region that resulted in a balanced increase in habitat for all species. Priority areas for revegetation generally were clustered around existing vegetation, although not always. Areas on richer soils and with high rainfall were more highly ranked, reflecting their potential to support high-quality habitats that have been disproportionately cleared for agriculture. Accounting for delayed development of habitat resources altered the rank-order of locations in the derived revegetation plan and led to improved expected outcomes for fragmentation-sensitive species. This work demonstrates the potential for systematic restoration planning at large scales that accounts for multiple objectives, which is urgently needed by land and natural resource managers.

Collapse of the world’s largest herbivores

Large wild herbivores are crucial to ecosystems and human societies. We highlight the 74 largest terrestrial herbivore species on Earth (body mass≥100 kg), the threats they face, their important and often overlooked ecosystem effects, and the conservation efforts needed to save them and their predators from extinction. Large herbivores aregenerally facing dramatic population declines and range contractions, such that ~60% are threatened with extinction. Nearly all threatened species are in developing countries, where major threats include hunting, land-use change, and resource depression by livestock. Loss of large herbivores can have cascading effects on other species including large carnivores, scavengers, mesoherbivores, small mammals, and ecological processes involving vegetation, hydrology, nutrient cycling, and fire regimes. The rate of large herbivore decline suggests that ever-largerswaths of the world will soon lack many of the vital ecological services these animals provide, resulting in enormous ecological and social costs.

Exploring comparative international accounting history

Accounting historians have long recognised accounting’s international scope but have typically concentrated their research endeavours on region- or country-specific studies, or on investigating the diffusion of accounting ideas, techniques and institutions from one country to others. Much potential exists to study the development of accounting from a comparative international perspective, mirroring the attention paid over the past two decades to the comparative study of international accounting practices and standards. This paper proposes a definition of comparative international accounting history (CIAH) and examines the nature and scope of studies within this genre. The CIAH approach is exemplified through an exploratory comparative study of agrarian accounting in Britain and Australia in the latter half of the nineteenth century. In the light of this study, the paper evaluates the potential of CIAH to contribute to an understanding of accounting’s past and provide insights into accounting’s present and future.

The costs of raising equity capital by Australian property trust initial public offerings

This paper reports some of the direct costs of raising equity capital by property trust initial public offerings (IPOs) in Australia from 1994 to 2004. It also documents the amount of underpricing by these IPOs. The results indicate the average fees paid to underwriters and/or stockbrokers in managing and marketing the issue was around 3.3% of the public equity capital raised. The average fees paid to legal firms, accounting firms and valuers for their professional involvement and expert reports were 0.4%, 0.2% and 0.1% respectively, totaling 0.7% of the equity raised. Other fees such as printing, listing fees, postage, distribution and advertising cost around 2.1%. The total average direct costs amounted to around 6.1% of the proceeds raised. The average underpricing by these property trust IPOs was 2.6%. This paper also investigates the hypotheses that the percentage direct capital raising costs are influenced by the size of the IPO and whether the IPO is underwritten. This study confirms that larger property trust equity capital raisings have lower percentage total direct cost;, however, it does not find that underwriting significantly influences the percentage of total direct costs for these property trust IPOs.

An evaluation of the role and impacts of alien finfish in Asian inland aquaculture

Asia dominates global aquaculture production accounting for over 80% of the total and the mainstay in Asian aquaculture is finfish. Over the years, Asia has experienced a number of inter-continental and intra-continental transfers/introductions/translocation of finfish species, between nations and watersheds, beyond their natural range of distribution, primarily for aquaculture development. In this article all such species are referred to as alien species. An attempt is made to evaluate the importance of the production of alien species in selected Asian nations, using statistics of the Food and Agriculture Organization. Also, negative effects, if any, based on literature surveys, of alien species in relation to displacement of indigenous species, and on biodiversity and/or genetic diversity together with associated pathogen transfers are evaluated. The major alien species, based on their significance to Asian inland aquaculture considered, are the tilapias, catfish, Chinese and Indian major carps and common carp. It is estimated that currently alien species account for nearly 12% of the cultured finfish production (2.6 million tonnes) in Asia, valued at US$ 2.59 billion, and the contribution exceeds 40% when Asian countries excluding China are taken into consideration. Inland finfish aquaculture in some Asian nations, such as Indonesia and the Philippines, is predominated by alien species, and in some others, e.g. Bangladesh and India, the contribution from alien species has been increasing steadily. It is suggested that overall alien finfish species have done little ecological harm to native flora and fauna. However, in the wake of increasing anthropogenic development taking place in watersheds the resulting environments are often made unconducive to indigenous species but not to some alien species, thereby potentially and indirectly making the latter invasive.

Factors influencing the direct costs of property trust IPOs

Underwriting, legal, accounting and valuation costs average around 3.3%, 0.39%, 0.23% and 0.12% of proceeds raised and are substantial costs to property trust initial public offering (IPO) issuers. As such, identifYing factors that influence these costs is important. This paper investigates factors influencing these costs as well as the total direct costs of raising equity capital by property trust IPOs in Australia from 1994 to 2004. The results suggest clear economies of scale in direct costs. In addition, IPOs that employ more debt are likely to have higher capital raising costs while those that have proportionally higher net asset values and offer stapled securities (and likely to be engaged in property development activities) have lower capital raising costs.

The costs of raising equity capital for closed-end fund IPOs

This article reports on some of the direct costs of raising equity capital by closed-end fund licensed investment company (LIC) initial public offerings (IPOs) in Australia from 1995 to 2005. The amount of underpricing by these IPOs is also identified. The average total direct costs amounted to a relatively low 3.4% of the capital raised, while fees paid to underwriters and/or stockbrokers was around 2.3%, to legal firms around 0.25% and to accounting firms around 0.07%. The average underpricing by these LIC IPOs was 1.3%. This article also confirms that the percentage total direct capital raising costs are inversely related to the size of the IPO and underwritten closed-end fund IPOs tend to have higher percentage total capital raising costs than those not underwritten.

Making long-term economic growth more sustainable: evaluating the costs and benefits

Currently, traditional development issues such as economic stagnation, poverty, hunger, and illness as well as newer challenges like environmental degradation and globalisation demand attention. Sustainable development, including its economic, environmental and social elements, is a key goal of decisionmakers. Optimal economic growth has also been a crucial goal of both development theorists and practitioners. This paper examines the conditions under which optimal growth might be sustainable, by assessing the costs and benefits of growth. Key environmental and social aspects are considered. The Ecol-Opt-Growth-1 model analyses economic–ecological interactions, including resource depletion, pollution, irreversibility, other environmental effects, and uncertainty. It addresses some important issues, including savings, investment, technical progress, substitutability of productive factors, intergenerational efficiency, equity, and policies to make economic growth more sustainable—a basic element of the sustainomics framework. The empirical results support growing concerns that costs of growth may outweigh its benefits, resulting in unsustainability. Basically, in a wide range of circumstances, long term economic growth is unsustainable due to increasing environmental damage. Nevertheless, the model has many options that can be explored by policy makers, to make the development path more sustainable, as advocated by sustainomics. One example suggests that government supported abatement programs are needed to move towards sustainable development, since the model runs without abatement were infeasible. The optimal rate of abatement increases over time. Abatement of pollution is necessary to improve ecosystem viability and increase sustainability. Further research is necessary to seek conditions under which alternative economic growth paths are likely to become sustainable.

Agency theory and accounting research : an overview of some conceptual and empirical issues

This chapter aims to give the reader an overview of agency theory (AT) and its application in accounting research. It delineates the basic assumptions and concepts of AT and identifies the various measures that can be undertaken to minimise agency costs. The chapter also provides a summary of the commonalities and differences across the three major paradigms adopted by accounting researches when using an agency framework: Principal-Agent, Transaction Cost Economics and Positivist (Rochester) model. Further, a review of some recent theoretical and empirical studies on the design of optimal contracts, namely those relating to implicit contracts, multi-agents and multi-period issues is undertaken. Several suggestions are made for future studies adopting an AT-based approach.

Accounting services and SMEs : an Australian study

Background: The observance of regulation has become a fundamental part of life for the conduct of business around the world. Governments and their duly appointed designates, acting in the interest of the collective public, have relied on regulation to moderate economic and social behaviour through the imposition and enforcement of rules. While it can be commonly accepted that such a prescriptive framework may be necessary for the achievement of desired economic and social outcomes, regulation does impose costs on society and on individual firms. These costs, which can include the costs for government departments to administer, the cost for firms to comply, and the multitude of indirect costs such as lost innovation and productivity or their interrelated opportunity costs, have received ample attention.

Accountants are key advisers to all businesses on all aspects of doing business, including regulation. As such, it is appropriate that ACCA has sponsored this study, which explores the regulatory issues facing SMEs and the critical role that accountants and other organisations play in helping SMEs be aware of, comply with and generally manage effectively the regulations that apply to their business.

ACCA has consistently argued for a balanced view to be taken on regulation, recognising that certain rules are necessary for the fair development of business and for employees’ rights. Yet at the same time, ACCA recognises that SMEs are likely to be disproportionately burdened by regulatory requirements and, as a consequence, it actively campaigns for fairness in regulation, recognising the issue as a significant factor in the success, productivity and growth of small businesses.

Overview: This study complements similar research commissioned by ACCA in the United Kingdom and Canada (Blackburn et al. 2006), with the aim of helping to provide a more international picture of the effects of regulation on adviceseeking by SMEs and how accountants can help SMEs meet their regulatory obligations.

The research commenced in November 2006 and was conducted over the Australian summer period 2006/7, among SMEs and accounting practices, as follows:

* telephone survey among 250 SMEs
* postal survey among 130 accounting practitioner firms.

Key findings: The SME section of this study revealed the following points.

* Most SMEs (between 70% and 80%), agreed that the regulations under review were reasonable, however there were significantly high levels of concern regarding:
* the number of regulations affecting their business (80%)
* staying up to date with changing regulations (80%)
* complexity of regulation or the ease of understanding regulations (77%)
* inequity, or the cost of regulation in proportion to the business (66%)
* duplication, or being required to provide the same information to more than one government department (55%).
* External accountants were the most common source of advice, being used by 72% of SMEs; this was followed by federal government agencies,    62%; trade or industry bodies, 61%; and a lawyer or solicitor, 53%.
* Highest levels of satisfaction with the advice provided were recorded for lawyers/solicitors (94%), banks (91%) and external accountants (90%).
* Overall, 80% of SMEs who had used accountants rated their service as excellent or good. Thirty per cent gave accountants an excellent rating.
* Accountants rated particularly well on the following attributes:
* the potential for a long-term relationship with the business (81% excellent/good)
* technical understanding of the regulatory requirements that apply to the business (79%)
* ability to meet the needs of the business (77%)
* understanding of the business of the SME and its operations (73%).

The survey of accounting practitioners produced the following information.
* The results indicate that SME firms with fewer than 10 employees are the main source of revenue for the respondent accounting practitioners.
* Virtually all accountants provide regulatory advice, primarily in the areas of taxation (particularly Goods and Services Tax, GST), and Do-It-      Yourself (DIY) superannuation requirements. These services provided the accountants with their largest business growth in the two years before the time of the survey.

Seventy-nine per cent of accountants referred their SME clients to external professional advisers. Their comments indicate (see Appendix 4) that some accountants consider their role to be as convenors or advisers for their SME clients. Importantly, according to the accountants, SME firms with fewer than 10 employees did not update their knowledge of regulatory requirements; they relied on their accountant for the right advice. The main types of external adviser to whom accountants referred their SME clients were lawyers and financial planners.

* Accountants expressed their concern regarding the complexity and amount of regulations affecting their SME clients.
* The accountants also stated that they would like to provide additional advice to their SME clients.
 
Confidence intervals – SME survey:  The survey sample size was 250 SMEs from the total of 1.2 million Australian SMEs. Any estimate of proportions agreeing or disagreeing with particular statements must be considered with respect to the margin of possible statistical error. Owing to the small sample size, generalising the results from this study to a wider population of SMEs may be constrained.

A 95% confidence interval of the sample mean for the following estimates based on a percentage agreement of 75% to a proposition with a sample size of 250 would be from 69.5% to 80.5%. The 95% confidence interval for estimates of any other value will diverge slightly in magnitude from the numbers given.

In general then we can be highly confident that the actual sample mean will be within approximately ± 5% of the figure given, with a survey of this size. Confidence intervals – acounting practitioner survey IBISWorld estimates reveal a figure of 9,222 accounting practices in Australia as at June 2006 (IBISWorld 2007). The sample size of 133 accounting practitioners gives a 95% confidence limit that the results reported from the mail-out survey are within the ± 5% confidence interval of the reported values.

Conclusions:  This report describes the results of two parallel surveys undertaken on the impact of business regulation on small and medium-sized enterprises in Australia and on the perceptions of accounting firms about the ways in which the regulatory impact on the SME sector drove their business.

The survey of SMEs provides empirical support for many of the concerns raised with the Regulation Taskforce, which reported to the Australian government in 2006. Many businesses are concerned about the volume and complexity of government legislation as it applies to their business. They are concerned that they are unable to keep up with new legislation and that there is apparent duplication of reporting requirements across the various tiers of government.

The survey of accountants revealed that accounting firms derive a significant proportion of their revenue from SMEs. While the SMEs are concerned with regulatory changes, the accountants surveyed reported that the major growth areas in their businesses were in what could be seen as traditional accounting areas of tax and superannuation. Some SMEs sought advice on areas such as employment law, environmental regulation and health and safety but it appears that many accountants refer their clients to specialists in these areas. Recent changes to the laws regarding financial planning in Australia may lead to changes in the market for financial advice in Australia, with many accountants apparently regarding this as a key driver of future business opportunities.

The surveys were conducted using a similar instrument to similar surveys conducted in the UK and Canada and reported in Blackburn et al. (2006). Comparisons of the Australian survey results with those from the UK and Canada seem to support the perception that Australian business is not over-regulated, but the SME sector is concerned with the volume and complexity of regulation. This suggests that the SME sector wants to see improvements to Australia’s regulatory regime as a result of the work of the Regulation Taskforce undertaken in 2005/6. In its response to the work of the Taskforce the government agreed with 158 of the 178 specific recommendations of the Taskforce. This now needs to be followed through at all levels of government.

Accountants in all three countries understand their SME clients’ concerns with the burden of regulation and they are prepared to advise their clients where appropriate or refer them to specialist advisers. Most business growth for accountants has come from the taxation area. Very few accountants in the UK or Australia specialise in providing advice in the areas of environmental regulation or health and safety regulation.

International comparisons show that in all three countries accountants are generally highly regarded by SMEs for their professionalism and competence. The major area of client concern is the value for money offered by the accountant’s service. In an era of rapidly shifting professional and technical boundaries, accountants need to be more strongly attuned to levels of client satisfaction. Lawyers, financial planners and a plethora of specialist advisers operate in the business services market and if they have an opportunity to take business from accountants by competing on price they may well do so. This suggests a stronger role for professional accounting bodies in monitoring the broader business services market for opportunities and threats on behalf of their membership.

Decision making to support an integrated infrastructure supply chain industrial ecological approach within public private partnerships

Supply chains are complex adaptive systems for which final performance depends upon numerous interdependent decisions made by numerous firms which synthesise inputs from various resources systems.  The dynamic interdependent behaviour of social, economic, material and informational resource systems within eco-industrial settings that support the built environment life cycle supply chains can be studied at the supply chain level.  The impact of megaprojects is significant and holds promise to explore the impact of decisions on various systems as it combines project and system boundaries.  Megaoprojects considered as major events within systems can produce critical revolutionary impacts on the systems within which they are embedded.  The decisions that are made on megaprojects are central to risk management.  typically major infrastructure projects are procured through a form of public private partnership (PPP).  The core principle of PPP is value for money which refers to the best available outcome attempting to take account of all benefits, costs and risks over the whole life of the procurement.  In this paper the focus is on Australia where there has been considerable acitivity in the use of PPPs.  With recent national infrastucture packages proposed to stimulate the economy due to the global financial crisis, decision modelling on risks is a revelant and critical matter not only in practice but also in the research community.  PPPs encourage the whole-of-lifecycle approach in the procurement and management of public sector assets by transparently recognising the costs and risks associated with the whole life of the required service or facility, thus integrated whole of life supply chains can be considered.  By creating a single point of responsibility for an entire project from inception through operation, a strong incentive is created for thinking about the effects that a design or construction decision will have on the effectiveness and efficiency of managing and maintaining a facility during its operational life.  The decision to procure holistic supply chains becomes a much more viable commercial reality in the PPP environment than previously considered in the usual commercial construction spot transactional approach.  These types of decisions tend to be imprecise, approximate and complex requireing justification and reasoning logic rather than the classical 'truth' logic.  The purpose of this paper is to develop a theoretical decision framework which combines interdependency and multi-values logic for supply chain procurement modelling.

Recognition of idle resources in time-driven activity-based costing and resource consumption accounting models

Despite its theoretical superiority over traditional volume-based costing models, the Activity-Based Costing (ABC) model has failed to replace traditional volume-based costing models in most organisations. In response to the problems of the model, Time-Driven Activity-Based Costing (TDABC) and Resource Consumption Accounting (RCA) models have been developed as costing models for next generation cost management systems. A key feature that distinguishes TDABC and RCA models from traditional volume-based costing models and the ABC model is the recognition of idle resources in resource pools.

This paper presents a discussion on implications of recognising idle resources in TDABC and RCA models on developments, maintenance and uses of cost management systems. A hypothetical case is presented to illustrate conversions of an ABC-based costing model to ones that are based on the TDABC and RCA models, and the resulting new allocation of resource costs.

Conservation ecology and breeding biology of the white-browed treecreeper, Climacteris affinis

The White-browed Treecreeper Climacteris affinis is one of many woodland-dependent birds that are at risk from the encroachment of human-dominated land-uses into natural landscapes. The White-browed Treecreeper inhabits semi-arid woodlands in north-west Victoria, Australia, a vegetation community that has undergone extreme modification in the last century due to the expansion of agriculture in the region. Extant woodlands represent only 10% of the original woodland cover in the region, and are highly fragmented and disturbed in many districts. Thus, the survival of the White-browed Treecreeper may depend on active management. However, current knowledge of the ecology and biology of this species is virtually non-existent, and inadequate for informed and effective conservation actions. The aim of this thesis is to redress this situation and provide the ecological basis for sound conservation management of the species. The thesis consists of two parts: an investigation of habitat use at three spatial scales and a study of the social organization, nesting requirements, breeding behaviour and reproductive success of a population of White-browed Treecreepers. Fifty-six patches of remnant woodland in north-west Victoria were surveyed to determine the factors affecting the occurrence of the White-browed Treecreeper at the regional scale. It was detected in 16 patches, and was largely confined to two core districts - Yarrara and, Wyperfeld (Pine Plains). The floristic composition of the dominant tree species was an important determinant of patch occupancy, with the results providing quantitative support for the previously suspected affinity for Belah Casuarina pauper and Slender Cypress-pine Callitris gracilis — Buloke Allocasuarina luehmannii woodlands. However, the absence of the White-browed Treecreeper from several districts was due to factors other than a lack of appropriate habitat. Demographic isolation - the distance from the focal patch to the nearest population of the White-browed Treecreeper - was the most important variable in explaining variation in patch occupancy. Patches isolated from other treecreeper populations by more than 8.3 km in landscapes of non-preferred native vegetation, and 3 km in agricultural landscapes, were unlikely to support the White-browed Treecreeper. The impact of habitat loss and fragmentation on the capacity of individuals to move through the landscape (i.e. functional connectivity) is considered in relation to disruption to dispersal and migration, and the potential collapse of local metapopulations. Habitat use was then examined in a network of patches and linear strips of Belah woodland embedded in a predominantly cultivated landscape. A minimum area of 18.5 ha of Belah woodland was identified as the most important criterion for patch occupancy at the local scale. This landscape appeared to be permeable to movement by the White-browed Treecreeper, facilitated by the extensive network of linear habitat, and clusters of small to medium fragments. The third scale of habitat use investigated the frequency of use of 1-ha plots within tracts of occupied woodland. It is important to discriminate between habitat traits that operate at the population level, and those that act as proximate cues for habitat selection by individuals. Woodlands that have high tree density, extensive cover of low-stature shrubs, abundant lichen, a complex vertical structure, and relatively low cover of grass and herbs are likely to support larger populations of the White-browed Treecreeper. However, individuals appeared to be using tree dominance (positive) and tall shrub cover (negative) as proximate environmental stimuli for habitat selectivity. A relatively high cover of ground lichen, which probably reflects a ground layer with low disturbance and high structural complexity, was also a reliable indicator of habitat use. Predictive models were developed which could be used to plan vegetation management to enhance habitat for the White-browed Treecreeper. The results of the regional, landscape and patch-scale investigations emphasise that factors operating at multiple spatial scales influence the suitability of remnant vegetation as habitat for the White-browed Treecreeper. The White-browed Treecreeper is typical of many small Australian passerines in that it has high annual survival, small clutches, a long breeding season, multiple broods and relatively low reproductive rates. Reproductive effort is adjusted through the number of clutches laid rather than clutch size. They occupy relatively large, all-purpose territories throughout the year. However, unlike many group territorial birds, territory size was not related to the number of occupants. The White-browed Treecreeper nests in tree hollows. They select hollows with a southerly orientation where possible, and prefer hollows that were higher from the ground. At Yarrara, there was considerable spatial variation in hollow abundance that, in concert with territorial constraints, restricted the actual availability of hollows to less than the absolute abundance of hollows. Thus, the availability of suitable hollows may limit reproductive productivity in some territories, although the magnitude of this constraint on overall population growth is predicted to be small. However, lack of recruitment of hollow-bearing trees would increase the potential for hollow availability to limit population growth. This prospect is particularly relevant in grazed remnants and those outside the reserve system. Facultative cooperative breeding was confirmed, with groups formed through male philopatry. Consequently, natal dispersal is female-biased, although there was no skew in the sex ratio of the fledglings or the general adult population. Helpers were observed performing all activities associated with parenting except copulation and brooding. Cooperatively breeding groups enjoyed higher fledgling productivity than simple pairs, after statistically accounting for territory and parental quality. However, the difference reflected increased productivity in the 1999-breeding season only, when climatic conditions were more favourable than in 1998. Breeding commenced earlier in 1999, and all breeding units were more likely to attempt a second brood. However, only breeders with helpers were successful in fledging second brood young, and it was this difference that accounted for the overall discrepancy in productivity. The key mechanism for increased success in cooperative groups was a reduction hi the interval between first and second broods, facilitated by compensatory reductions in the level of care to the first brood. Thus, females with helpers probably achieved significant energetic savings during this period, which enabled them to re-lay sooner. Furthermore, they were able to recommence nesting when the fledglings from the first brood were younger because there were more adults to feed the dependent juveniles. The current utility, and possible evolutionary pathways, of cooperative breeding is examined from the perspective of both breeders and helpers. Breeders benefit through enhanced fledgling productivity in good breeding conditions and a reduction in the burden of parental care, which may impart significant energetic savings. Further, breeders may facilitate philopatry as a means for ensuring a minimum level of reproductive success. Helpers benefit through an increase in their inclusive fitness in the absence of opportunities for independent breeding (i.e. ecological constraints) and access to breeding vacancies in the natal or adjacent territories (i.e. benefits of philopatry). However, the majority of breeding unit-years comprised unassisted breeders, which suggests that pairs are selectively favoured under certain environmental or demographic conditions.