TERM-H2O: modelling water use in southern Australia
Dr. Glyn Wittwer (right) was previously best known as a specialist in the
international wine market, but since joining the Centre of Policy Studies he and other CoPS staff have used variants of the TERM CGE model to
analyse water shortage and trading in the Murray-Darling basin. TERM (The Enormous Regional
Model) is a "bottom-up" CGE model of Australia which treats each region as a separate economy. It is further described here. The key feature of TERM, in comparison to predecessors such as MMRF, is its ability to handle a
greater number of regions or sectors. The most recent TERM master database represents 172 sectors in 206 statistical sub-divisions (SSDs),
allowing the model to accurately represent water catchment, major urban or tourism regions. Glyn and others have added a detailed treatment of
farm water use to create the specialized TERM-H2O model, which focusses on water-related issues.
Forthcoming book publication
TERM-H2O and related work is described in a new book, Economic Modeling of Water: The Australian CGE Experience, edited by Dr. Wittwer,
which will be published by Springer in April 2012. More details here.
Other publications
TERM or TERMH2O underlie several other water-related publications:
Horridge, J.M., Madden, J.R. and G. Wittwer (2005), "The impact of the 2002-03 drought on Australia", Journal of Policy Modeling, Vol
27/3, pp. 285-308.
Peterson, Dwyer, Appels & Fry (2005), Water Trade in the Southern Murray-Darling Basin, The Economic Record, 81
Dixon, P., Rimmer, M. and Wittwer, G. (2011), "Saving the Southern Murray-Darling Basin: the Economic Effects of a Buyback of Irrigation
Water", Economic Record, 87(276): 153-168.
Wittwer, G. and Griffith, M. (2011), "Modelling drought and recovery in the southern Murray-Darling basin", Australian Journal of
Agricultural and Resource Economics. 55(3): 342-359.
Wittwer, G. (2011), "Confusing policy and catastrophe: buybacks and drought in the Murray-Darling Basin", Economic Papers 30(3):
289-295.
Press coverage
A February 2011 article in The Age newspaper reported that: "Contrary to the farm lobby's pessimism, economic modelling predicts that
federal government water buybacks will deliver a small boost to economic activity across the southern Murray-Darling Basin." Read the article
here. The modelling was
performed using TERMH2O.
Dr. Glyn Wittwer (right) was previously best known as a specialist in the
international wine market, but since joining the Centre of Policy Studies he and other CoPS staff have used variants of the TERM CGE model to
analyse water shortage and trading in the Murray-Darling basin. TERM (The Enormous Regional
Model) is a "bottom-up" CGE model of Australia which treats each region as a separate economy. It is further described here. The key feature of TERM, in comparison to predecessors such as MMRF, is its ability to handle a
greater number of regions or sectors. The most recent TERM master database represents 172 sectors in 206 statistical sub-divisions (SSDs),
allowing the model to accurately represent water catchment, major urban or tourism regions. Glyn and others have added a detailed treatment of
farm water use to create the specialized TERM-H2O model, which focusses on water-related issues.
