SIGHTINGS


 
Australia Debates
Population 'Asianisation'
And Huge Growth
By Michael Perry
8-5-98
 
 
SYDNEY, Aug 2 (Reuters) - ``Populate or Perish'' was once the rallying call for high immigration in Australia, but today many here are calling for a smaller population. Far right politician Pauline Hanson has called for zero net migration to counter what her One Nation party calls the ``Asianisation of Australia.'' Environmentalists argue for a lowering of immigration and population, saying the current 18.5 million population is ecologically unsustainable. But some prominent business leaders are calling for a major increase for economic reasons. So how many people should live in Australia? NO POPULATION POLICY Australia has no population policy, despite discussion of the issue since World War One. People then talked of a future nation of 100 million people. ``The cart must not be placed before the horse, making population policy merely an undefined, inexplicit consequence of immigration policy,'' said former Labor government science minister Barry Jones in the last population report in 1994. Australia has no target population. Immigration is determined on an annual basis, which both sides of the debate agree is ad hoc. They also agree that there is a lack of political will to publicly tackle such issues, especially with the rise of the ultra-conservative One Nation. Former Liberal prime minister Malcolm Fraser wants a vigorous public debate. ``I think it is absolutely critical for the future of Australia to have that debate. I think Australia, as it is, cannot survive.'' Asia's booming populations create a geopolitical reason to increase population to 45 or 50 million by 2050, Fraser believes. ``We are going to be regarded as wealthy, selfish, lazy, introspective, sidelined, irrelevant to the world, if we are only a nation by then of 20 to 23 million people,'' he says. HOWARD TRIMS MIGRATION FIGURES Australia's population is one of the fastest growing among members of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development. The Australian Bureau of Statistics on July 14 estimated the population could reach 26.4 million by 2051. Since its election in March 1996, Prime Minister John Howard's conservative government has reduced immigration to 80,000 in 1998-99, with net permanent migrants around 55,000. The bureau said the population would be capped at 20 million in 2025 if One Nation's zero net migration proposal, which would mean 30,000 permanent migrants a year, was adopted. It would then decline between 2025 and 2029 as Australia's fertility rate is now at an all-time low of 1.7 children per woman or 10 percent below replacement level. Australia's population is ageing, exerting pressure on economic growth as the workforce declines and welfare and health budgets rise. Business leaders believe the population must increase to a ``critical mass'' to sustain long-term economic growth and talk of a 50 million population by 2050 -- which would require an annual migrant intake of around 200,000. ``If we are to sustain strong, high levels of economic growth we need to have a strong underpinning population base and that can only be achieved through strong migration levels,'' says David Buckingham, from the Business Council of Australia. A comprehensive 1988 immigration and population report by Stephen Fitzgerald, now chairman of the Asia-Australia Institute, called for an annual immigration level of 125,000. The report said such an intake level would boost gross domestic product by between 0.07 to 0.16 percent, while a higher intake of 220,000 would produce a gain of 0.09 to 0.21 percent. Skilled migrants have invested A$300 million (US$185 million) in Australia in the past three years, says a government survey released in May. AUSTRALIA THE EMPTY LAND Terra Nullius (Empty Land) was the legal premise on which modern Australia was built, enabling white settlers in 1788 to ignore Aborigines as the original inhabitants. Terra Nullius has been rejected as a legal concept but large tracts of land remain empty, with 95 percent of people living on 10 percent of the land, as 80 percent is arid or desert. Australian Museum scientist Tim Flannery warns in his landmark book ``The Future Eaters'' that Australia has a fragile environment which cannot sustain its current population. Flannery says population should not exceed 20-30 percent of the land's carrying capacity -- which means Australia's long-term sustainable population is only six to 12 million. Flannery says the environment has suffered major degradation since white settlement, with 70 percent of the 22 million hectares (54 million acres) of farmed land now degraded. ``To this extent, and to the extent that these problems are ongoing, Australia can be defined as being already overpopulated,'' says Flannery.





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