Australia’s Population in the 21^st Century: Being Realistic

Governments are gun-shy about very long term population policy for understandable reasons.

Firstly, citizens generally do not think long into the future about anything. And apart from escapist futurism (eg. science fiction) which is entertaining, most forecasts--however prescient--are treated with alarm if not shock-horror. They are at least controversial, if not the cause of deep divisions of opinion and often fuelled by fanaticism at both ends of the spectrum. Such polarisation arises about the future of social behaviour and lifestyles, technology, new types of industries and jobs, international relations, immigration levels and much more.

Secondly, governments do not have a good track record of picking winners. Mind you, neither do most pundits. The exceptions prove the rule, eg. Jules Verne, Arthur C. Clarke, Buckmaster Fuller, maybe Nostradamus. If pundits get it wrong they may get ridiculed; but governments lose office. So why forecast and plan? Because not to do so is worse, and irresponsible.

Thirdly, governments are aware that population policy has audiences outside Australia as well as inside, particularly the immigration component of policy, creating a potential double jeopardy. If immigration policy numbers are too high for Australian consumption, the risk is alarm inside Australia and raised expectations outside Australia which are beyond our capacity to fulfil. If they are too low or restrictive we get boat people and other illegal immigration, and again local alarm.

There are few things as explosive as population forecasts and policy. To governments’ credit, the ABS is called upon to generate scenarios from time to time; and currently we have the Statistician’s options (three of them) out towards the middle of the 21st Century. None of the options would scare a dog off its chain; all options are for more modest growth than in the second half of the 20th Century.

Professor Borrie undertook the previous long range forecast in the early seventies and despite lower predictions for the Year 2000 than most believed, he got it right (around 19 million for the Year 2000) for his lower-end forecast. Many thought it would be nearer 25 million at the time. But rapidly falling fertility rates and lower immigration rates (as a percentage of the population) put paid to that level. In the current forecasts, the ABS suggest that 25 million is the most optimistic forecast of all for the Year 2040!

As we enter the new century and millennium, immigration rates are the key to population levels. Birthrates less death rates--representing the natural increase--are perhaps more predictable and least argued.

What do we learn from history in this regard?

Firstly, the immigration rate has averaged around 0.7% of population over the past 150 years, equivalent to around 134,000 per annum in 1999-00 (or twice what we will actually take in this year). Secondly, immigration runs in cycles. The peaks have been around 1817, 1852, 1883, 1919, 1950 and 1988; around 34-35 years apart on average. Will the next peak be around the early 2020s?

Two of the troughs, on the other hand, have been deep and long, notably 1892-1908 (the 16 years of the 1890s Depression) and 1928-1947 (the 19 years of the 1930s Depression and World War II). History therefore tells us that raising immigration levels while unemployment is high (i.e. over 5% of the labourforce) is political suicide even though increased immigration helps lower the unemployment rate; perceptions prevailing in the face of facts and logic. So, with the current level of unemployment around seven percent, we have an electorate unlikely to entertain higher immigration for 5-7 years hence. Beyond 2005-06, though, is likely to be a period of increased sanguinity and largesse for higher immigration levels.

But there is another lesson from history and an important one: immigration increases are due to exogenous factors as much as, if not more than, internal (domestic) factors. Examples abound: the 1788 European Colonisation (against indigenous wishes); the 1850s Gold Rush; the 1880s Land Boomers; and the post-1940s Refugee response.

There will be more of these exogenous factors in the 21st Century.

One of the more important will be our integration if not eventual assimilation into the Asia Pacific economy and society. The world is aggregating into bigger communities and bigger economies, and has been doing so for many millennia. We have moved households into tribes, tribes into territories, territories into states, states into nations, now nations into regions (eg. EU, NAFTA, CIS, Mercatur) and – in the second half of the next century – regions into the global village and economy.

Facilitators are the Internet, global finance, tourism without visas, the UN, the WTO and more. The logic is based on ending wars, increasing scales of economy (and standards of living) and a growing appreciation of our only known liveable planet, Spaceship Earth. Many issues reinforce this, including global warming and the need for sustainable environments.

The emergence of an Asia Pacific Region – with "sovereignty" al la the EU – will devolve many (but not all) issues to a higher government. Population policy is likely to be on such an agenda. Just as immigration policy was ceded by State Governments in Australia to the National (Federal) government in 1901, some partial devolution to our Asia Pacific Regional body could be anticipated in the next century. So today’s exogenous factors could become internal factors (to the Region) in the 21st Century.

Scary? Yes but hasn’t just about every other dramatic change been scary before the reality throughout history?

As we enter the 21st Century, estimates of desirable population levels for Australia range from 6-12 million (Tim Flannery) to 100-150 million by the Year 2100 (Phil Ruthven).

The low level proponents cite ecological constraints and cultural harmony. Some are hiding closet xenophobia if not racism. The sole high proponent or rather forecaster, and the author of this article, cites realism (the emerging borderless world), international morality and defence (by co-operation) as the reasons for the likely higher figure. Others would add economic advancement as a reason for higher immigration and population levels, but it is well to remember that 12 of the Top 20 Standard of Living nations (of around 240 nations) in the world today have population levels lower than Australia.

The low level proponents suggest our environment is fragile and we do not have enough water or useable land for many more inhabitants. Yes, our environment is fragile which suggests we should be careful; but we should always remember it is not so much the number of people that upsets the fragility so much as their activity.

The "useable land" claim will carry nothing but disbelief and derision from the rest of the world and especially our neighbours in the Asia Pacific, because:

1. Australia has 34% of the land mass of the Asia Pacific and 1% of its population.
2. If just 20% of Australia’s land mass is "useable" then our density rises from 2 people/sq km to 12 people/sq km (equal lowest in region).
3. Japan’s "useable" land mass is 15% (of its 370,000 sq km) or around the size of Tasmania. Its effective density is therefore 1650 persons/sq km.
4. The same calculation for other neighbours in the Asia Pacific yields similar sobering facts.

We live in a denser world than many care to acknowledge. The world’s density of population is currently 45 per sq. km (on inhabited land masses); and the Asia Pacific’s density is 90 per sq km. The table below is food for thought.

The emerging borderless world is adopting global morality via the UN and other organisations – the Iraq War, the Kosovo War and East Timor - and as demonstrated by the actions of Amnesty International etc.

This is leading to nations having to think outside-in (what others think) not inside-out (only what we think)

It is leading to borderless finance, information, trade (WTO) and tourism. We are not far off the abolition not only of visas but also passports (at least within sovereign regions).

The bottom line is realism: get real, as Generation Xers would say.

A population density of 2-3 people/sq km or 12 people/sq km on 'useable land' will be indefensible. It is worth noting that in the 21st Century the world is likely to have the first city of 100 million people, according to at least one leading world urbanologist. If Australia had 50 new cities of 2 million people each around the coastline by the end of the 21st Century, they could be 750 km apart, a 11/2 hr plane trip!

Undoubtedly, Australians in the future will have to adopt world best practice in terms of a sustainable environment rather than assume that a static population is the best way to protect it.

In the second quarter (if not the end of the first quarter) of the 21st Century, the Asia Pacific is likely to become a sovereign region (a la EU, NAFTA, CIS). This will accelerate after the WTO Agreement (free trade) is a reality in the region around 2025. The then Asia Pacific Commission is likely to have population policies on the agenda in due course.

Perhaps a final note of realism centres on the time frames. If we look out to the end of the 21st Century, we are looking at 5-7 generations hence. Today's generations cannot make policy let alone legislate population levels that far out: subsequent generations can and will make up their own mind at the time. Therefore governments can only create policy for limited times, perhaps as short as an electoral period of three years. Beyond such short horizons, we are talking about wish-lists or forecasting.