A tale of two water markets in Australia: lessons for understanding participation in formal water markets

Water markets are promoted as a demand-management strategy for addressing water scarcity. Although there is an increasing literature on the institutional preconditions required for successful formal water markets, there has been less focus on understanding what drives participation after establishment of the basic enabling conditions. Participation can be measured in terms of either trading activity (conducting either a permanent or temporary water trade) and/or trade volumes across time and market products. Australia’s water markets in the Southern and Northern Basins of the Murray-Darling Basin provide a notable example of a ‘tale of two water markets’, offering insights about the economic policy levers that can drive participation across different hydrological, irrigation, and socioeconomic contexts. Key lessons include: distribution of initial property rights in resource allocation; the need to prepare for and seize opportunities to strengthen property rights; and robust monitoring and compliance requirements—all of which will reduce transaction costs and increase participation.

THE NATURAL RIGHT OF PROPERTY

The two main theses of “The Natural Right of Property” are: (i) that persons possess an original, non-acquired right not to be precluded from making extra-personal material their own (or from exercising discretionary control over what they have made their own); and (ii) that this right can and does take the form of a right that others abide by the rules of a (justifiable) practice of property which facilitates persons making extra-personal material their own (and exercising discretionary control over what they have made their own). I articulate some of the good reasons we have to affirm persons' possession of an original, non-acquired right of self-ownership and argue that the same good reasons support the ascription to persons of a natural right of property. I contrast an “inherent feature” conception of the actions through which (initial) rights over extra-personal objects arise with a “practice” conception of (initial) entitlement-generating actions. I argue that the fact that the natural right to property can and does take the form of persons' rights that others abide by the rules of a (justifiable) practice of property explains how there are many instances of (initial) entitlement generation which are not plausibly explained by those wed to the inherent feature conception of entitlement-generating actions and why there is a strong conventional dimension in the procedures through which persons acquire (initial) property rights.

Initial and ongoing unit times and unit costs for property mapping and parcel indexing in new brunswick

Unit times and unit costs for initial and ongoing property mapping and parcel indexing have been established from time/task and expenditure records at the regional office of LRIS in Bathurst from June 1, 1979, the date it was opened, to March 31,1986. During the first five years of this period, the initial property mapping and parcel indexing for the 108 000 parcels in Restigouche, Gloucester, and Northumberland counties was completed; during the latter two years of the period the property mapping and parcel indexing were kept up-to-date by incorporating the results of the 24 953 changes that occurred. Person time was normalized to the Property Mapper I level, and expenditures were converted to 1981 Canadian dollar equivalents. The time, 93 minutes, required to make each change was somewhat less than the time, 108 minutes, for the initial property mapping and parcel indexing; similarly, the unit cost per change, 1981C$17.63, was less than the cost, 1981 C$26.95, for the initial compilation.