.id insight March 2012

.id community monthly newsletter

March 2012

In This Issue

Parramatta - the heart of Western Sydney?

Census Countdown

Inside .id

Making an impact on jobs

Tips and Tricks - Economic Development Policy

Google glasses and the digital economy

Quick Link

Greetings!

You know, the economic health of a council region is becoming more important to local government.

I the past, many councils didn't consider Economic Development to be part of their bailiwick, and they left it to other levels of government to sort out. But I've noticed a couple of things happening over the last few years:

Firstly, State and Federal Governments have seemed to back away from their Economic Development responsibilities, at least at a local level. They prefer to look at the "big picture" (maybe where there are big numbers of votes to be had?) and have largely ignored the Economic Development needs of local communities.

At the same time, councils have realised that Economic Development is a key driver of the overall health of the community - as such things as local youth unemployment, limited local jobs and poor business opportunities create many other community issues.

And thirdly, Economic Development dovetails in to many other council activities - traffic loads on local roads, local transport needs, community development programs and much more.

It just makes sense. A council provides so many services to their community - libraries, community services, recreation, asset management, waste management and hundreds more services - why would local jobs, youth employment, essential job training and business investment be left out?

And many councils agree.

Since the launch of economy .id a couple of years ago, already over 40 councils around Australia are using it to help understand their economies, investigate issues and develop strong, supportive Economic Development policies. You can check out the list of economy .id clients here..

This newsletter has a central Economic Development theme, and we are using that theme to underline our new module for economy .id, Impact Assessment Modelling.

Please enjoy the newsletter, and if you have any questions, we'd love to help. We would value the opportunity to help you create your local Economic Development agenda....

Sincerely,

ivan-motley-id

Ivan

Focus on Local Government

Is Parramatta the economic heart of Western Sydney?

Parramatta was Australia's first inland European settlement, and is often referred to as Sydney's second CBD.

While you could also make this claim for a few other areas in Sydney, the data shows that the City of Parramatta does have the largest employment of any Local Government Area (LGA) in Greater Sydney, outside the City of Sydney itself. In 2006 it had the 8th largest working population of any LGA in Australia, after the 5 capital city LGAs, Gold Coast and Canberra.

What else can we learn about this powerhouse economy in Western Sydney?

Census Countdown

Are we about to surf another wave of European migration?

International migration is certainly not a new phenomenon but in recent decades the volume of people moving between countries has increased substantially.

The globalisation of the world economy, as well as improving transportation and communications, are key factors behind this increase.

The World Bank estimates that over 200 million people live outside their country of birth - and that's just the official estimate.

Australia and Singapore both have a long history of international migration, and potential new trends have recently gained media attention in both countries.

id office

inside .id

Reliable local area economic data is no longer hard to come by

With something like 200 councils using profile.id® over the past 15 years or so, a frequently asked question at council briefing and training sessions has been, "Can you extend profile.id® to include economic data?"

These requests grew in number as Local Government's role in economic development has grown. Quite simply, this was the inspiration to develop economy.id® - and now to extend it with an Impact Assessment model.

However, getting reliable economic data for sub-State economies is a significant challenge and this blog discusses how we discovered a solution by partnering with economic brains trust, NIEIR.

A word from our researchers

Making an impact on jobs

When does creating jobs in the city lead to more jobs in the countryside?

We recently introduced an Impact Assessment Model to our economy.id resource for local government. It shows the impact of adding (or losing) jobs in one industry sector throughout the entire supply chain.

I knew this would be extremely important for councils wanting to demonstrate the full value of attracting jobs to their area, but what I hadn't counted on, was how much I would learn about the structure of local and regional economies - especially when combining the model with other information included in economy.id.

Tips and Tricks

How to uncover issues in your economy to inform Economic Development policy, using economy.id

To develop successful Economic Development strategies, you need to know about your local economy.

You need to know its strengths, and weaknesses.

You need to know where it fits in the overall competitive framework - and what role and function your economy serves.

How can economy .id help you to answer the important questions about your economy, and uncover the hidden issues?

Final word

Google glasses provide a view of the digital economy

NBN Co and the Federal Government have been raving on for a while about the Digital Economy in their "Digital Economy strategy".

So what is the Digital Economy, and what's the big deal?

And what do Google glasses have to do with it?

Quick Contact

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