摘要：The Australian Sheep Industry Cooperative Research Centre (Sheep CRC) commenced operations in February 2002 and will receive federal funding of $19.8 million over its seven-year grant period. As well, the sheep industry is expected to invest over $10 million in Sheep CRC activities over this period, while core and supporting parties will make in-kind contributions totalling about $60 million. The main objective of the Sheep CRC is to develop new technologies that will increase the productivity and profitability of sheep meat and wool production and provide the skills and knowledge needed to fully utilise the available technologies. The Sheep CRC will be considered to have been successful if its outcomes have delivered measurable economic benefits to the sheep industry and to the rural communities. Accordingly, the Sheep CRC has placed a high priority on the rigorous economic evaluation of its research activities. With a focus on the production technology programs, that requirement has included the preliminary economic evaluation of a large number of individual projects. The more comprehensive evaluation of groups of projects is now being attempted. This paper describes the procedures that have been adopted in making those evaluations and presents some preliminary results.
