VCCAP Newsletter - Number 5 - June 2010
Newsletter # 5, June 2010
Scenarios Development | Expanding our ability to visualise climate change futures | Adaptive capacity in the south-west Victorian dairy industry | Actions government can take to assist primary industries - A dairy industry case study | DPI VCCAP evaluated | DPI survey of 1500 Victorian farmers on climate and emissions | Barwon South West (BSW) Climate Change survey and Forum results | Search and discovery of VCCAP’s climate change simulation modelling | The DPI VCCAP Forum 2010 | CATCLIM: The Catchment Analysis Toolkit (CAT) climate change module
Introduction from the Project Leader
Welcome to the final newsletter from the current phase of the DPI VCCAP. Over the past three years the team have focused on the likely biophysical, social, economic and policy impacts of climate change on agriculture in south-west Victoria. While the south-west region of Victoria will experience some negative impacts from climate change, this region has some key advantages relative to other parts of Victoria. This will create some opportunities as well as some competitive pressures on agriculture in the region.
While this newsletter provides some insights into the potential impacts and opportunities climate change will bring to southwest Victoria, those wanting more information can access detailed reports from each theme within DPI VCCAP (contacts provided throughout). Further information on theme findings can be found on the CD of presentations made at the DPI VCCAP Forum held in March (for more information see page 7).
Also in the pipeline is the development of a collective synthesis of the DPI VCCAP work over the past three years. This will form part of the final report and will be available from the project team in July 2010.
The next challenge for DPI will be to apply to the whole of Victoria the tools, methods and capability that VCCAP has developed so that we can better understand the climate change impacts and adaptations required for all of Victorian agriculture. Although funding for this work is yet to be finalised, we are hopeful that the exciting work of the DPI VCCAP team will continue informing the adaptation of Victorian primary industries to climate change.
A final thought on climate change itself: The Federal government’s decision to postpone the Emission Trading Scheme (ETS) until 2013 does not mean climate change is on hold for three years. Likewise, a reasonable start to the wet season this year cannot in any way be taken to mean that climate change is over. One of the greatest dangers we face is to be lulled into apathy by short-term policy or climate trends. In reality we cannot make any conclusions from trends anything shorter than about 30 years, otherwise we are merely confused by the ‘noise’ from our highly variable climate.
At the same time, farmers are unlikely to respond to something 30 years away when they are faced by far more challenging pressures in the next few months and years. This is then the challenge of communicating the key messages from DPI VCCAP, as clearly there are some messages for farmers now (e.g. awareness, improving resilience to variability), but different messages for regional planning, industry and policy (e.g. long term infrastructure planning, research investment). Part of our task now is to ensure this information is provided to these various audiences; this newsletter being just one of the communication tools.
Scenarios for agriculture in Victoria’s southwest
Leon Soste, DPI VCCAP Scenario Development
| The primary aim of the Scenario theme was to inform policy on the likely systemic effects of climate and non climate change on agriculture and communities in south-west Victoria. To achieve this aim, we engaged 40-50 experienced regional stakeholders, supplemented by an extensive literature review on global and national drivers of change for agriculture, to formulate 3 contextual scenarios. In summary, those scenarios considered:
|  | | |  Following the rains in south west Victoria (Karen Wales SWCCF) |
Using the experience of 25 stakeholders, and the results of model-based analyses, we explored the likely consequences of the scenarios for regional agriculture, business, communities and the environment. We then considered systemic implications for the region. Finally, using the insights gained from that assessment, stakeholders developed a suite of integrated regional adaptation strategies.
Those insights led to the following key messages for policy.
Strengthen regional leadership capabilities
Innovation will not come from agencies, it will come from individuals. On-going processes to foster regional leadership capability make a vital contribution to the continued strength and adaptive capacity of the region.
Deliver integrated regional planning
Regional agriculture functions within a complex agro-socioecological system. When elements of those systems are perturbed by climate or other drivers, the whole system will seek to re-equilibrate. Dealing effectively with such systemic change will therefore require an integrated, wholeof-government approach to policy development, regional planning and program implementation.
Develop effective regional engagement processes
A detailed understanding of regional agro-socio-ecological is, at least in part, resident within the broader regional stakeholder community. As government seeks to deal effectively with systemic change, stakeholder knowledge will make a valuable contribution.
Contact: Leon Soste, Future Farming Systems Research Division
E-mail: leon.soste@dpi.vic.gov.au
Expanding our ability to visualise climate change futures
Falak Sheth, Jean-Philippe Aurambout and Chris Pettit, DPI VCCAP Visualisation
It is said that a picture is worth a thousand words. The DPI VCCAP Visualisation team believes that an image or an animated representation of reality can create a more insightful understanding of climate change futures than any report could. However, the computer processing time associated with the production of realistic representations of digital data can be enormous. A one minute animation may require up to two weeks processing time on a standard desktop computer. To streamline this process and decrease production time, the DPI VCCAP Visualisation team with support from DPI Knowledge Information and Technology Division have completed the development and deployment of a “high performance 3D visualisation rendering facility”. This information, communication and technology infrastructure, hosted in Bendigo, enables the VCCAP Visualisation team to process high quality 3D realistic landscape visualisations in a fraction of the time required using the previous computer infrastructure.
| This infrastructure comprises a cluster of four high-end computers working together to generate high quality animations and graphics. The computer cluster has been designed to render computer generated images using a batch processing technique. The use of this infrastructure will significantly reduce the 3D visualisation rendering time allowing week long processes to be achieved in days. Over the duration of the DPI VCCAP project a number of innovative visualisation products have been developed. The Visualisation team are planning a workshop in Hamilton in June to showcase the final array of visualisation products produced for South-West Victoria to evaluate their effectiveness in communicating complex climate information. If you would like to be a part of this exciting workshop please contact Jean-Philippe Aurambout. | | | |  Virtual representation of wheat farm in south west of Victoria. |
Contact: Falak Sheth, Jean-Philippe Aurambout and Chris Pettit, Future Farming Systems Research Division
E-mail: jeanphilippe.aurambout@dpi.vic.gov.au, Future Farming Systems Research Division
Adaptive Capacity in the south-west Victorian Dairy Industry
Meghan Bond and Patricia Fitzsimons, DPI VCCAP Institutional Adaptation
On Thursday 10th December 2009, key institutional stakeholders directly and indirectly related to the south-west dairy industry met to explore the important socio-culturaleconomic components of adaptation to climate change. The workshop centred on the creation of a participatory Adaptive Capacity Index (ACI).
The benefit of an ACI is the ability to identify the specific needs of regions and/or sectors in their adaptation to the impacts of climate change. During the workshop participants, individually and in groups, used systems thinking and deliberative processes to explore key values, needs and indicators related to adaptive capacity.
| The first component of the workshops used systems thinking to define the scope and the context for the ACI and to discuss how the future ‘ought’ to be. The second phase of the workshop focussed on the indicator selection process. The outcome of each groups’ choices were entered into an online spatial mapping platform, the National Data Grid (NDG). The NDG is being developed by the CRC for Spatial Information. Once the indicators were entered into the NDG, participants could view a demonstration of the spatial variation of adaptive capacity for a sub-section of their region. A final GIS image was generated to capture the totality of the south-west region. This image displays the overall top ten group indicators selected and weighed, with the darker red shades indicating higher adaptive capacity than the lighter shades. | | | |  Spatial map of the Dairy Industry ACI |
In addition to the creation of the ACI, information was collected, via written records of the systems thinking group exercise, participant observations, and the completion of a social network analysis and an evaluation survey.
Key insights that emerged out of these activities were;
Stakeholders in the south-west Dairy Industry demonstrated broad values and understandings of sustainability; inclusive of concerns over social equity, ecological limits and the desire for more cooperative approaches to dealing with the complex issue of climate change.
The indicator selection and weighting process demonstrated an understanding of the cultural, political, social and economic factors that enhance the capacity of regional communities to adapt and change. The highest ranked and weighted indicators were consistently around themes of education, socio-economic status, demographic changes, community involvement and human well-being.
Insights from a network analysis and the evaluation survey demonstrated the emergence of discussions and an increasing number of projects on climate change adaptation in the south west region and the desire for on-going capacity building and adaptation action.
From reflecting on the process a key learning has been the need for long-term engagement, where government acts as a facilitator and works alongside regional institutions to build their capacity and enable adaptation actions. A report has been prepared on the workshop, in addition to a technical report, both are available by contacting:
Contact: Meghan Bond or Patricia Fitzsimons, Farm Services Victoria
Email: meghan.bond@dpi.vic.gov.au or patricia.fitzsimons@dpi.vic.gov.au
Actions government can take to assist primary industries to adapt to climate change - A dairy industry case study
Jean Sandall, Fiona Johnson, Geoff Kaine, Ruth Lourey and Megan Higson, DPI VCCAP Policy Research
Pasture based industries dominate Victoria’s landscape and contribute a significant amount to the region’s economy. In 2005-06 dairy contributed $694.5 million, beef cattle $375 million, sheep and lamb $216 million and the wool $216 million (ref: Liu, E. and Fitzsimons, P. (2009) Regional Economic Profile of South West Victoria. Victorian Department of Primary Industries, Melbourne). Climate change forecasts suggest that grazing animals are likely to be adversely affected by climate change.
In particular, heat waves and an increase in the incidence of days with temperatures over 30 degrees Celsius are expected to impact grazing animals through:
- reduced feed intake
- increased water intake
- changed metabolic rate and maintenance requirements
- increased evaporative water loss
- increased respiration rate
- changed blood hormone content
- increased body temperature
- behavioural change (e.g. shade seeking)
Managing heat stress in grazing animals under climate change may require a substantive change in management practice for farmers. If this is the case, farmers could utilise the learnings from regions to the north to successfully make this transition. Moreover, energy and water requirements to manage heat stress may have flow-on effects on greenhouse gas emissions and water quality.
As the dairy industry is Victoria’s largest rural industry, this industry was chosen by the DPI VCCAP’s policy theme as a case study to explore
- when policy responses may be justified to assist farmers to manage heat stress
- when policy responses are justified, efficient types of policy instruments
The findings revealed that current knowledge on managing heat stress may be insufficient to enable successful adaptation to climate change. In addition, the private benefits of investing in the new knowledge required may be difficult to capture. Therefore, government intervention may be justified to assist farmers to manage heat stress. This policy response may take the form of an extension program providing customised information to assist landholders manage heat stress. Further modifications or refinements of such a policy response may be necessary in the future given the level of uncertainty around heat stress impacts and the extent of future adaptation that may be required. As such, the policy objective may change over time and require the policy response to be reviewed; the Policy Choice Framework can be used to do this.
Contact: Ruth Lourey, Farm Services Victoria
Email: ruth.lourey@dpi.vic.gov.au
DPI VCCAP Evaluated
Natalie Tostovrsnik, DPI VCCAP Communications & Utilisation
A comprehensive evaluation of DPI VCCAP has been conducted to assess the projects impact. The main aim of the evaluation was to identify the effectiveness of DPI VCCAP in informing policy decision making.
The main results of this evaluation show that stakeholders consider that the project:
- delivered good value relative to the resources invested
- engaged stakeholders effectively
- successfully influenced and informed policy decision-making
- increased the capacity of DPI in the area of climate change adaptation research
- effectively utilised the South West Climate Change Forum (SWCCF) to develop and ground-truth methodologies and findings
Opportunities for project improvement were also identified. Some of these included an increased integration of the various DPI VCCAP research themes plus the need for a functioning and active Inter-Departmental Committee. This would ensure greater inter-departmental collaboration and direction in the climate change adaptation area.
Risks to the operation of DPI VCCAP and strategies to address these were also identified in the evaluation. The main risks identified include the difficulty of ready access to regional communities (SWCCF aside) and the reliance on individuals for engagement with policy. This could be addressed through the utilisation of more formal structures or processes.
A number of recommendations have been formulated for future work in the area covered by DPI VCCAP. These recommendations comprise of:
- addressing policy stakeholder engagement
- retaining existing staff resources to maintain momentum
- supporting steering and governance committees
- emphasising the significance of links to other national and international bodies
- identifying the role landholders already play in adapting to climate change
- supporting ‘ground truthing’ research in the regions with stakeholders
Email: natalie.tostovrsnik@dpi.vic.gov.au
DPI survey of 1500 Victorian farmers on climate and emissions
Graeme Anderson, Senior Subject Specialist - Climate Change, DPI Farm Services Victoria
The Victorian Government’s Future Farming Strategy “Planning for climate change” extension program is busy, with over 300 sessions delivered by staff to over 8000 people in the first 18 months. While interest in emissions has taken a back seat since December, we’re inundated with interest from farmers and service providers wanting to know more about the drivers of Victoria’s seasons, what’s natural variability and what’s happening to our weather systems at the moment.
The survey of 1500 Victorian farmers has provided some terrific insights into the attitudes and knowledge of farmers on issues relating to climate change, climate drivers and farm emissions and carbon. We will use these results to improve our communication and engagement with farmers and service providers, and we hope to repeat the survey in a few years to see if our program has been able to improve understanding. Anyone seeking a briefing on the survey please make contact with us. The full report can be found at www.widcorp.com (external link).
Some highlights from the survey include:
| | | |  The rain gauge ( Karen Wales SWCCF). |
Contact: Graeme Anderson, Farm Services Victoria
Email: graeme.anderson@dpi.vic.gov.au
Barwon South West (BSW) Climate Change Survey and Forum results available
Karen Wales, Project Officer, South West Climate Change Forum
In 2009, South West Climate Change Forum (SWCCF) on behalf of the BSW Regional Management Forum Climate Change Working Group (BSW RMF CCWG) undertook a survey of climate change initiatives in the Barwon South West was undertaken focusing on government agencies, authorities and closely associated groups. Data collection was by phone and e-mail with respondents providing the information within a set of predefined categories. Respondents were asked for details of initiatives for which the main or primary focus (or at least, strong secondary goal) was climate change.
The survey process involved:
- Contact with 160+ people and over 60 organisations
- Recording of 139 activities
- Data collection focused upon agencies, authorities and associated groups.
The survey results indicated that the majority of climate change activities were:
- 1. Locally based (not region-wide)
- Not viewed as driven by external policy
- Involved extension activities
- Targeted at the community or in-house staff / decision makers
- Focused on adaptation or adaptation/mitigation
- Ongoing
- Delivered by shire councils, primary industry groups, health and NRM and resource sectors
- Delivered in partnerships with other government departments or organisations with a close connection
Multi-issue, but where single issues were targeted, the most common were agriculture, waste management, biodiversity, water, alternative energy and health.
The Barwon South West Climate Change Forum on the 12th November 2009 brought together 75 people from 33 organisations at Deakin University Warrnambool. The participants were provided with examples of leading climate change activity in the region and copies of the survey summary before breaking into workshops to explore priority areas, opportunities and ways forward for regional climate change action.
| The BSW RMF CCWG is currently looking at progressing recommendations based on the results of the survey and forum around developing an interactive web site, an annual conference and a climate change community of practice for the region. To access the final report and the full survey results go to www.swccf.com.au or contact Karen Wales on 03 5562 0021 / karen@swccf.com.au | | | | Following the rains in south west Victoria (Karen Wales SWCCF) |
Search and Discovery of VCCAP’s climate change simulation modelling
Chris Pettit and Deb Jenkins, DPI VCCAP e-Resource Centre
The DPI VCCAP project has developed and applied an extensive number of computer based models to understand the likely impact and adaptation options to climate change in south-west Victoria. These computer models include simulations of temperature, and rainfall, land suitability, land use change, crop simulation, adaptive capacity and three dimensional models of future landscapes. However, how can you search which models have been run where and who the key contact is to learn more about this model and its outputs?
| The Model Information Knowledge Environment (MIKE) is an online search and discovery tool which has been developed by DPI in collaboration with the Victorian eResearch Strategic Initiative. There are over 100 model instances for South-West Victoria that have been run by or in collaboration with the DPI VCCAP project. MIKE will be released very soon. If you are interested in learning more about MIKE please contact us. Contact: Deb Jenkins, Future Farming Systems Research Division Email: deborah.jenkins@dpi.vic.gov.au | | | |  Model Information Knowledge Environment (MIKE) on the web |
DPI VCCAP Forum 2010 at Colac
Glenn Morrison, DPI VCCAP Communications & Utilisation
During March, the DPI VCCAP project team ‘upped stumps’ from their individual sites and converged on Colac in South-West Victoria to present some of their findings from the previous three years. Presentations from the research themes focused on the outcomes of their research and were management staff. Colac was seen as the appropriate place to make presentations, being within the projects reference area. Those attending represented Department of Primary Industry (DPI) policy, DPI project management, local government, Catchment Management Authorities (CMA), Department of Sustainability and Environment (DSE) and local industry.
The results of an evaluation survey following the Forum found that the majority of respondents found the day useful. Some attendee comments include “[the Forum] was a useful update of the different aspects of the project” and that the event “helped pull disparate bits of information together”.
The project is nearing the end of phase one and the reporting of results for the past three years is wrapping up with project reports due in June.
Richard Eckard, the project’s science leader introduced the day and the following research topics were presented:
- A regional perspective on the economics of climate change – Esther Liu
- Creating a participative adaptive capacity index – Meghan Bond
- Economic conditions that may justify Government action to assist primary industries to adapt to climate change – Jean Sandall
- Grain response to climate change in Victoria – Garry O’Leary
- Hydrological response to climate change – Brendan Christy
- Demonstrating VCCAP results using visualisations – Jean-Philippe Aurambout
- Land suitability analysis – Mike Morris
- Stakeholders, scenarios and systemic planning – Leon Soste
- Institutional adaptation and climate change – Patricia Fitzsimons
- South West Climate Change Forum – Karen Wales
- A summary of VCCAP findings – Natalie Tostovrsnik
If you would like a DVD copy of the presentations please send a request to:
Contact: Glenn Morrison, Future Farming Systems, Research Division
Email: glenn.morrison@dpi.vic.gov.au
CATCLIM: The Catchment Analysis Toolkit (CAT) climate change module
Anna Weeks, Brendan Christy and Garry O’Leary, DPI VCCAP Impact Modelling
The Catchment Analysis Toolkit (CAT) climate change module, CATCLIM, has been developed as part of DPI VCCAP to generate future climate patterns to assess the likely impacts of climate change on cropping systems in Victoria. CATCLIM is a user-interface that sits within the CAT modelling framework and enables flexible, repeatable, batch methods to generate future climate data.
CATCLIM was developed to generate future climate sequences based on the International Panel of Climate Change (IPPC) predictions of future global warming scenarios. The model also accounts for regional impacts of global warming in Victoria, using spatial maps of the expected pattern of change in climate developed by CSIRO. The model scales the historical climate data then generates a spatially interpolated daily climate sequence which can be utilised in a number of catchment and farming systems models.
Daily point source weather station data is sourced from Bureau of Meteorology SILO service ( www.bom.gov.au/silo/ ). The daily ‘Patched Point Data’ contains rainfall, minimum and maximum temperature, radiation, evaporation and vapour pressure. The data reflects the original Bureau of Meteorology measurements at a given climate station with all gaps in-filled using interpolation methods.
The IPCC estimates are available at the global scale and predict increasing mean temperatures as well as elevated atmospheric CO2 concentrations for a range of future scenarios including low, medium and extreme increase in global warming. CATCLIM requires an input file containing global warming factors as percent values for each of the global warming scenarios to be run.
The mean-monthly pattern of change data comes from CSIRO’s global atmosphere models (CCAM-Mark2 and CCAMMark3) 50x50 km grid-cell pattern for Victoria.
Because climate stations are located sparsely, daily rainfall and temperature data are scaled according to interpolated mean-monthly spatial layers. Interpolated surfaces are created using the ANUCLIM software ( http://fennerschool.anu.edu.au/ publications/software/anuclim.php ) that combines a digital elevation model (DEM) and temporal climatic data to generate a smoothed climate surface at a user-defined cell size. The ANUCLIM surfaces are used to scale across space the point-source weather station data for a historic run and the point-source climate-changed data for a climate change run.
Contact: Anna Weeks, Future Farming Systems Research Division
Email: anna.weeks@dpi.vic.gov.au
DPI VCCAP is supported by the Department of Primary Industries Victoria and the Ecologically Sustainable Action Statement.
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Published by: Department of Primary Industries 1 Spring Street, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. December 2009
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This document was last reviewed on 17/02/2011