ASIA
09 September 2022
THE NEW AUSTRALIA
Over the last 2 years Australia has gone through monumental changes which most people participated in but were not specifically aware of it, writes Glen Robinson.
Firstly, there were the droughts on Australia’s eastern coast, then followed the Australian 2019/2020 bushfire season which was one of the worst in recent times. The season started in early November 2019 in New South Wales, and gradually progressed in Victoria, Western Australia, South Australia, and the Australian Capital Territory. Thousands of firefighters and volunteers battled the fires, with millions of hectares burned, thousands of properties damaged, and countless numbers of wildlife exposed. In February 2020, the last fires were reportedly extinguished, with torrential rain assisting in putting out the remaining fires. In the meantime 34 people had been killed and over 4000 admitted to hospital with smoke related problems, and over 5,900 buildings (including 2,779 homes) destroyed together with an over 3 billion animals killed. As of 28 October 2020, the fires burnt an estimated 24.3–3.8 million hectares (60–84 million acres; 243,000–338,000 square kilometres;), destroyed over 5,900 buildings (including 2,779 homes) and killed at least 34 people. It was claimed that three billion terrestrial vertebrates – the vast majority being reptiles, were also decimated (https://www.statista.com/statistics/1104739/australia-bushfire-human-fatalities-by-state/ (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2019%E2%80%9320_Australian_bushfire_season)
As the bushfires were abating, we were attacked by the Corona Virus which went through several mutations and caused untold havoc. There have been 14,000 deaths and almost 1,000,000 cases due to the virus. While this is comparably low in comparison to our international compatriots [UK, USA, France, Italy] it was still a major disruption, and it is actually continuing (https://www.health.gov.au/health-alerts/covid-19/case-numbers-and-statistics)
While all this was going on, The Russians decided to attack Ukraine which has destabilized and disrupted the world’s supply chain and routes, and many products are not available or have become very expensive. There is another element to this which is really disagreeable. During the covid pandemic, the government paid out considerable funds to a range of companies to assist them through the pandemic, and when business began to return to [almost] normal, some of those companies had made a significant profit despite the virus and refused to return the government funds.
As a personal experience, during the 2 nd week of the Russian attacks, the price of petrol increased by well over 100 %, for petrol which had been produced and shipped to Australia many months previously, so the price increase was gouging, a practice which is almost certainly being adopted by some operators
These events were almost coinciding when the federal election was conducted, and the results of that election are incredible. While it is usual for one of the two main parties to be a winner, on this occasion, the results were split almost 30 % for each of the 2 main parties and the remaining 30% went to a loose grouping of independents. This has never occurred previously and demonstrates that the population has changed in its thinking and probably in its actions.
Another interesting factor has been the way in which the country has embraced the linkages to international groupings [COP, UNESCO, G20 ETC], something which it has only performed dutifully in the past, and apparently grudgingly. Right now, we seem to be well and truly part of the international community.
These events while seemingly separate and unrelated, do tend to demonstrate or at least hint at a significant change in our attitude to the global community. While we remain fiercely independent, we now openly discuss moving to more manufacturing and more self-reliance, as we recognise that supply chain disruptions cause havoc to our day-to-day existence, because we tended to take a laisse fair approach to our existence.
We seem to have developed a singularly independent attitude, moving away from being the deputy sheriff to the world’s most bellicose country, which in itself has demonstrated to the world that it was unable to contain the rice farmers in Vietnam or the goat herders in Afghanistan.
Australia remains a country made up of ghettos, each one slightly different to the other, the differences are in many small ways but do exhibit themselves in dress, slight differences in accent, and other matters related to income and life expectations.
As a consequence of the droughts, fires, floods, medical pandemics, and product and shortages of goods which dominated the news for the 2 years to 2022, we are thinking about our place in the world, and how we might “insure’ ourselves for the future. Several answers are proposed, including significantly increasing the locally produced goods, a great idea, but we are not really up for this. Consider your last visit to Bunnings or Coles, and just look at the items for sale, and picture them being made in NSW or Vic, then consider your i-phone, with its components currently manufactured in 40 different factories in 40 different countries, and you see that it is difficult to visualize that. Also consider your vehicle, currently made in Thailand with 2500 suppliers and 450,000 employees, and it becomes clear that we have to be very selective on what we plan to produce in Australia, and how we are going to do it.
It will be interesting to see the developments over the next decade as Australia adopts its next persona or at least modifies its current persona.
Sept 2022
Glen Robinson B.Sc. (Tech) JP
Glen has more than 35 years’ experience providing advice and assistance to those organisations which wished to establish or enhance a commercial presence in ASEAN. He is a co-founder and director of Asean Focus Group which was established in 1990. He has worked on many projects in southeast Asia and was for many years an advisor to the Thailand Board of Investment. He is a member of the board of directors of the Australia Thailand Business Council, and is a member of the Council of the Australian Institute of International Affairs, NSW Division
As the bushfires were abating, we were attacked by the Corona Virus which went through several mutations and caused untold havoc. There have been 14,000 deaths and almost 1,000,000 cases due to the virus. While this is comparably low in comparison to our international compatriots [UK, USA, France, Italy] it was still a major disruption, and it is actually continuing (https://www.health.gov.au/health-alerts/covid-19/case-numbers-and-statistics)
While all this was going on, The Russians decided to attack Ukraine which has destabilized and disrupted the world’s supply chain and routes, and many products are not available or have become very expensive. There is another element to this which is really disagreeable. During the covid pandemic, the government paid out considerable funds to a range of companies to assist them through the pandemic, and when business began to return to [almost] normal, some of those companies had made a significant profit despite the virus and refused to return the government funds.
As a personal experience, during the 2 nd week of the Russian attacks, the price of petrol increased by well over 100 %, for petrol which had been produced and shipped to Australia many months previously, so the price increase was gouging, a practice which is almost certainly being adopted by some operators
These events were almost coinciding when the federal election was conducted, and the results of that election are incredible. While it is usual for one of the two main parties to be a winner, on this occasion, the results were split almost 30 % for each of the 2 main parties and the remaining 30% went to a loose grouping of independents. This has never occurred previously and demonstrates that the population has changed in its thinking and probably in its actions.
Another interesting factor has been the way in which the country has embraced the linkages to international groupings [COP, UNESCO, G20 ETC], something which it has only performed dutifully in the past, and apparently grudgingly. Right now, we seem to be well and truly part of the international community.
These events while seemingly separate and unrelated, do tend to demonstrate or at least hint at a significant change in our attitude to the global community. While we remain fiercely independent, we now openly discuss moving to more manufacturing and more self-reliance, as we recognise that supply chain disruptions cause havoc to our day-to-day existence, because we tended to take a laisse fair approach to our existence.
We seem to have developed a singularly independent attitude, moving away from being the deputy sheriff to the world’s most bellicose country, which in itself has demonstrated to the world that it was unable to contain the rice farmers in Vietnam or the goat herders in Afghanistan.
Australia remains a country made up of ghettos, each one slightly different to the other, the differences are in many small ways but do exhibit themselves in dress, slight differences in accent, and other matters related to income and life expectations.
As a consequence of the droughts, fires, floods, medical pandemics, and product and shortages of goods which dominated the news for the 2 years to 2022, we are thinking about our place in the world, and how we might “insure’ ourselves for the future. Several answers are proposed, including significantly increasing the locally produced goods, a great idea, but we are not really up for this. Consider your last visit to Bunnings or Coles, and just look at the items for sale, and picture them being made in NSW or Vic, then consider your i-phone, with its components currently manufactured in 40 different factories in 40 different countries, and you see that it is difficult to visualize that. Also consider your vehicle, currently made in Thailand with 2500 suppliers and 450,000 employees, and it becomes clear that we have to be very selective on what we plan to produce in Australia, and how we are going to do it.
It will be interesting to see the developments over the next decade as Australia adopts its next persona or at least modifies its current persona.
Acknowledgements
Glen RobinsonSept 2022
Glen Robinson B.Sc. (Tech) JP
Glen has more than 35 years’ experience providing advice and assistance to those organisations which wished to establish or enhance a commercial presence in ASEAN. He is a co-founder and director of Asean Focus Group which was established in 1990. He has worked on many projects in southeast Asia and was for many years an advisor to the Thailand Board of Investment. He is a member of the board of directors of the Australia Thailand Business Council, and is a member of the Council of the Australian Institute of International Affairs, NSW Division