Social and Economic Data Sources for Natural Resource Management

Product Information

Social and economic information is increasingly being recognised as vitally important for natural resource management (NRM). Socio-economic information plays an important role in NRM decision making by:

• providing context to regional planning through enhanced understanding of baseline social and economic conditions and processes which impact upon a region’s capacity for NRM,
• enhancing understanding of the social and economic impacts of particular interventions, noting that impacts can be positive or negative and unevenly distributed in the community,
• contributing to the monitoring and evaluation of the effectiveness of NRM interventions,
  and
• informing the assumptions which underpin major policy initiatives, particularly in relation to the decision making behaviour of individuals, families and firms.

Demand for these statistics is high, with policy makers (both state and Commonwealth), industry groups and regional and catchment management groups seeking socio-economic data to underpin their NRM efforts.

There are several sources of social and economic statistics that can be used to develop accurate estimates at regional and national levels appropriate to support NRM. The purpose of this information paper is to assist the development of a suite of social and economic indicators by identifying current sources of socio-economic information suitable for producing regional and national level estimates.

The paper outlines the range of sources for particular socio-economic topics, with the sources primarily restricted to those collected or coordinated at the Commonwealth Government level. While social and economic data is also collected by state, territory and local authorities, it is expected that the individual state or territory would be better positioned to provide a more comprehensive analysis of these data sources.