Given that landholder and community support are critical to the success of industry resource protection, there is a strong emphasis on involving people from outside the agency in resource allocation decisions. We aim to work with these people and project managers to clarify the expected outcomes relative to 'no project' or an alternative strategy. Transparency of analyses is important. Given the frequent uncertainty, sensitivity analysis is also important. We ask experts to estimate minimum and maximum values and reference these estimates.
Readers can then gauge for themselves the credibility of the assumptions used.
A draft of each analysis is reviewed by a working group comprising Project Manager, Program Manager, Board member and one or more people working in the industry. Versions of the spreadsheet PCES, an adaptation of REVS by Neil Thomson, are most commonly used for our analyses. A single benefit-cost ratio from a draft analysis can mislead and create unnecessary angst. Therefore, our analyses are confidential to the Industry Resource Protection Program until endorsed and released by the Agriculture Protection Board. Another activity will be conducting workshop sessions for Regional Advisory Committees to help them prioritise among pest species and management strategies.