ANU Vice-Chancellor Professor Ian Young
The following was published in The Canberra Times, 16 April 2013.
Most Canberrans appreciate the important role their city’s universities play educating our youth, contributing to the culture of this city and in the expansion of knowledge through research. But very few of us, however, appreciate how critical higher education is to the Canberra economy as a major industry. ANU, the University of Canberra (UC), the Australian Catholic University and the Australian Defence Force Academy have combined budgets of approximately $2 billion. This is money largely spent in the ACT community. After government, they bring more money into the ACT than any other industry.
Our universities enrol approximately 30,000 students, approximately 8,000 of whom have come from overseas, and a further 8,400 who have come from other states. The ACT is unique in Australia that so many of its students come from interstate or overseas. This means that ACT universities are a major export earner. In fact, our universities are the second largest export earners for the ACT after government. Each student who moves to Canberra to study pays fees, purchases accommodation, invites their friends and family to visit and spends money in the ACT economy.
They bring an estimated total economic benefit to the ACT of approximately $500 million a year. They help support retail, tourism, hospitality, construction and other sectors.
This means a significant part of our economy is dependent on the continued success of our universities – a particularly important consideration for Canberra at a time when we are facing the likelihood that the public service will shrink in coming years. I believe this will be the case regardless of which party is in power, and so in a city so dependent on government for its economic future, Canberra will more than ever before look to the economic input of its universities to support the economy.
Students are only one part of that economic equation. Research and the commercialization of research is also playing an increasingly important role in our economy, with real growth occurring in the number of high-technology start-up companies in the ACT. It is still early days, but as Australia’s best educated city with major research capability in our universities, Canberra is well placed to carve out a unique place in Australia as an incubator for innovative ideas and businesses.
ANU and UC are well placed to continue to attract the brightest students from interstate and overseas, and grow that contribution to the ACT economy. The international reputation of ANU as a highly ranked research institution means it has capacity to keep building and commercializing its research, and attracting innovative people and businesses to the ACT.
The ACT Government understands the critical role ANU and UC play in our economy and is supportive of growth. Universities are not corporations, but in addition to being institutions of enormous intellectual and cultural influence, they are big business and big employers, with a profound impact on the economy.
In Australia, universities are deeply impacted by changes in government funding, and I expect that we will see that funding constrained in coming years. Just this week we have seen the Commonwealth Government announce major cuts to university funding which will have significant impacts. This will mean we increasingly need to find private sources of funding for the growth and quality of research and education that is so important to our prosperity. Despite a high Australian dollar and enormous competition from the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom, Australia’s universities and those in Canberra, in particular, continue to grow international student numbers. I expect this to continue in the future. Similarly, I expect post-graduate education, largely funded by students who wish to enhance their skills, will continue to grow.
Canberra has a real opportunity to stamp its mark as a place renowned for education, research and innovation, just as Boston, Silicon Valley, London and Melbourne have done.
But to do this we need more than publicity. We need to harness the international and national reputation of our universities and ensure Canberra is recognised as a vibrant and inviting destination for smart students, researchers and entrepreneurs. This is eminently possible, but, more than ever before requires a true partnership between our universities, the ACT Government and the people of Canberra. Together, we can create an economy for our national capital which ensures ‘Canberra’ is shorthand for something well beyond Parliament House.
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