UNE Business School and the Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society present the  2014 John Dillon Memorial Lecture

 12.30 pm, Thursday 24 July; John L. Dillon Lecture Theatre (LT4), W42, Economics, Business and Law Building

Competitiveness and Pricing in the Australian Grains Industry

Emeritus Professor Gordon MacAulay

University of Sydney

Since the 1970s Australian agriculture has been on a path of deregulation. The various protective functions that had existed no longer protect Australian agriculture which now has very low rates of government assistance and intervention.  In these circumstances the effective competitiveness of Australian agriculture becomes a critical factor in its profitability. It is now a key issue of how can Australia’s competitiveness on a global scale be improved. Mixed with this issue is how are prices determined on a global basis all the way down to the farm gate level.  The question of pricing and competitiveness in the Australian grains industry is the topic of this talk.

Gordon MacAulay is currently Principal Economist at Grain Growers and is also Emeritus Professor of Agricultural Economics at the University of Sydney.  He previously was Head of Department of Agricultural Economics at the University of Sydney, Chief Research Economist at ABARE and Lecturer and Senior Lecturer at the University of New England and also worked as an economist in Agriculture Canada.  He was the first PhD in agricultural economics from the University of Guelph in Canada.

Gordon’s specialty over his academic career has been spatial equilibrium modelling but he has worked in various fields in agricultural economics, and a variety of industries and commodities.  He worked in a number of countries including Canada, the former Soviet Union, Indonesia and China, and spent over 17 years contributing to teaching and research into land and natural resource use in Vietnam.  Gordon served in various roles in the Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society, including the Editorial Committee and as President in 1994. He gave a Presidential address on the economics of an agricultural economics society using the theory of club goods. In 2011 he was awarded Distinguished Fellow of the Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society.  He also had a three-year term from 2001 to 2003 as an independent member of the Wheat Export Authority and he contributed to the research work of the Royal Commission into Grain Storage, Handling and Transportation from 1990 to 1992. Most recently, Gordon has been involved in Grains Research and Development Corporation research and training programs for the Australian grains industry and a range of other projects in BRI Australia (formerly the Bread Research Institute) and Grain Growers.