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Business View Australia - September 2015 19
lead to increased demand in other
areas of the economy.
Increase in Automation
and the Use of Robots
As new technologies develop and
make robots cheaper and give them
the ability to performadditional tasks,
the trend of automation in various
sectors will increase rapidly. There is
already a proliferation of driverless
trains and vehicles in the mining
industry. In the near future robots
will be extensively used to carry out
repetitive tasks like cleaning, digging,
spraying and testing.
This trend will have the effect of
reducing the need for many types
of unskilled and semi-skilled labour
and simultaneously increase the
demand for personnel with technical
and computer related knowledge.
Overall, this is a positive development
as it will make Australian industry
more competitive. But it will call
for retraining and reskilling of large
numbers of workers.
Contribution of the
Services Sector
The lower Australian dollar and
the surging demand from Asia has
served to boost the services sector,
especially education and tourism.
A telling statistic is that in the last
year, the country’s education exports
were the third largest export earners,
behind only iron ore and coal.
The tourism industry has also picked
up, buoyed by the country’s weak
currency and a massive increase
in the number of Chinese tourists.
The annual number of visitors from
China currently stands at 940,000,
as against 400,000 five years ago.
Meanwhile, Chinese international
student enrolment has increased by
11% so far in 2015 compared to the
same period last year.
Rebalancing of
the Economy
In the immediate future these
trends will result in changes which
will make the economy less reliant
on commodities. In fact, the service
sector, which already accounts for
a massive 69% of the economy,
will further strengthen as a result
of growth in segments like tourism
and education. Consequently the job
market will also see a change with
more opportunities in the service
sector and stagnation or reduction
in manufacturing and industrial
employment numbers.
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