Having been brought up on a farm in Buckinghamshire, UK, Michael Burton had no real interest in agriculture as a career destination. However, a first degree in Economics from Bath University (1981), and the lure of a postgraduate scholarship took him to Manchester University for a Masters in Agricultural Economics. This provided the basis for the type of research that he has followed since: an interest in applied economics within the area of agricultural (and later natural resource) economics, with a strong emphasis on the application of quantitative techniques. A PhD, again at Manchester, led him to build a statistical model of the UK agricultural sector but gave the freedom to follow research interests into almost any area, in particular the analysis of food demand. He joined the academic staff in the-then Department of Agricultural Economics at Manchester in 1985, and remained there until he joined Agricultural and Resource Economics at UWA in 1998. The shift in hemispheres has led to a change in focus, but not in approach: He is currently working in the area of quantitative approaches to valuing environmental resources.