Postdoctoral Fellow
Building coherent policy frames for agricultural commodity industries
Phone: +61 2 6125 4760
Fax: + 61 (0)2 6125 0746
E-mail: judith.ajani@anu.edu.au

Judith is an economist, graduating with honours from the School of Economics, University of Melbourne (1978) and a PhD in resource and environmental management from ANU (2002). She has worked in the Australian Bureau of Statistics, Bureau of Industry Economics, Port of Melbourne Authority and the Victorian industry department where she managed manufacturing policy for the Victorian wood based industries. Since entering ANU in 1996, Judith has concentrated her research on building environmentally and economically coherent policy frames for the agricultural sector (notably wood production) recognising the cost-cutting nature of commodity production. Her work is deeply integrative - history, ecology, economics, politics, institutional analysis and policy. Judith used integration to investigate why, despite the existence of a pragmatic solution, Australia has not resolved its forest conflict. Her findings are presented in 'The Forest Wars' (MUP 2007). She is currently working with colleagues on how best to integrate forests in Australia's climate change mitigation policy and is preparing to broaden her research into the food production sector. Judith is a strong advocate for communicating university research and analysis to enhance public policy debates.

Selected Publications

Ajani J. (2010) 'Climate change policy distortions in the wood and food market', contributed paper to the Australian Agricultural and Resource Economics Society National Conference 2010. See PDF of paper (220kb, pdf)

Ajani J. (2008) 'Australia's transition from native forests to plantations: the implications for woodchips, pulpmills, tax breaks and climate change', Agenda: A Journal of Policy Analysis and Reform, 15(3), 2008.

Wood P.D. and Ajani J. (2008), Submission (plus addendum) to the Commonwealth Government on the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme Green Paper.

Ajani J. (2007) 'Gunns' double-barrelled dilemma', The Age Opinion & Analysis, 11 October 2007, p. 14.

Ajani J. (2007) 'Ending the forest wars', Australian Review of Public Affairs election 2007 publication.

Ajani J. (2007) 'Rudd's forest policy sees him right alongside the PM', Opinion The Canberra Times 25 July 2007, p. 13.

Ajani J. (2007) The Forest Wars, Melbourne University Press.

Ajani (formerly Clark) J. (2004) 'Forest policy for sustainable commodity wood production: an examination drawing on the Australian experience', Ecological Economics 50, 219-232.

Ajani (formerly Clark) J. (2003) 'A new forest and wood industry policy framework for Australia', Chapter 11 in David Lindenmayer & Jerry Franklin (eds) Towards Forest Sustainability, CSIRO Publishing.

Ajani (formerly Clark) J. (2003) 'Western Australia's forest industry policy: a stocktake', presentation to the Western Australian Cabinet Standing Committee on Protecting Our Old Growth Forests Policy, Perth, Western Australia, 14 April 2003.

Ajani (formerly Clark) J. (2002) The Introduction of Agriculture for Wood Production in Australia: Public Policy Lessons From the Softwood Planting Program, PhD Thesis, The Australian National University.

Ajani (formerly Clark) J. (2001) 'The global wood market, prices and plantation investment: an examination drawing on the Australian experience', Environmental Conservation 28 (1): 53-64.