AUSTRALIA – AN IMMIGRATION NATION

With over 6,500 spoken languages in the world today it is hard to imagine the thousands of different ways humans greet one another across the globe. However, 2,000 of these languages have fewer than 1,000 speakers. The most popular language spoken across our globe is Mandarin Chinese with some 1,213,000,000 speakers.

The top ten reported languages spoken across our globe is quite amazing. In order of popularity they are Chinese; Spanish; English; Hindi; Arabic; Portuguese; Bengali; Russian; Japanese and Punjabi. In 2016, the Australian Census revealed that over 300 separately identified languages were spoken in Australian homes.

More than 21% speak a language other than English in their homes. Most common languages include Mandarin; Arabic; Cantonese; Vietnamese and Italian. Australian Indigenous languages are spoken by less than 1% of the total population. Tasmania holds the highest percentage of people speaking only English at home (88%) while the Northern Territory holds the lowest percentage of people speaking only English at home with 58%. This congers up the view that the Northern Territory is somewhat of a haven for newcomers to Australia and enjoys a culturally diverse society.

This just goes to show what a diverse nation Australia is. The 2016 Australian Census also revealed that 67% of the Australian population were born in Australia. England and New Zealand were the most common countries of birth after Australia, with the population of people born in China and India have steadily increased since 2011. Of the 6,163,667 people born overseas, one in five had arrived since the start of 2012, and 83% of overseas-born population lived in capital cities compared with 61% of people born in Australia. Sydney had the largest overseas-born population.

One in four people living in Australia were born overseas. While 46% have at least one parent who was born overseas. Statistics show that overseas migration represented 60% of Australia’s population growth in 2013.

Migrants make an enormous contribution to Australia’s economy and provide an estimated fiscal benefit of over 10 billion dollars in their first ten years of settlement.

Published statistics by the Australian Government reports that international education activity brings $19.1 billion in export income for the higher education sector; $4.8 billion in earnings for the VET sector; $1.4 billion for the ELICOS sector; schools $1.2 billion, and non-award education by $981 million.

As Australia continues its history of being an immigration nation, we feel very proud to be a part of this history and assisting in the nation’s economic and population growth as Australian Immigration advisers. It is truly magnificent to help people through their journey and dream of calling Australia home! We truly love how Australia is a place where culture is respected, celebrated and shared, and to be a part of that daily is outstanding, fun and exciting!