Australian ICT skills and education rank highly against other international markets. The nation's educational system is ranked seventh in the world and the university system is ranked second in the region for meeting the needs of a competitive economy¹.

The solid international ties, language skills, culture of innovation and ICT expertise of the Australian workforce have led multinationals such as EDS, IBM, Microsoft, and NEC to base their regional operations in Australia. These factors, and more, ensure an environment conducive for international firms to conduct business in Australia.

The high standards and reputation of the Australian education system have long been recognised in international markets and have lifted annual enrolment of overseas students to 25 per cent of all students studying in Australian universities².

Australia offers a deep pool of skilled ICT workers with a tertiary education enrolment rate that is the highest in the Asia-Pacific region and ranked third in the world.

Educated ICT graduates

Most of Australia's 39 universities offer undergraduate and graduate courses in core ICT disciplines such as information systems, computer systems engineering and computer science.

The widespread experience of teaching core ICT disciplines has allowed the Australian education system to develop specialised study programs for leading-edge and highly specialised and targeted IT disciplines.

The quality of Australia's education and training sector is internationally recognised. In 2006³, Australia was ranked as having six of the top fifty universities in the world, and more specifically as having:

• 2 of the top 5 (or 4 of the top 10) universities in the Asia Pacific;
• 4 of the top 50 universities in science in the world⁴; and,
• 2 of the top 20 (or 5 of the top 30) universities in technology in the world⁵.

Flexible and highly skilled workforce

Australia is ranked highly for the availability of IT skills, qualified engineers and research and development personnel⁶. The country is home to one of the most multilingual workforces in the Asia Pacific region, with citizens from over 200 countries. About 3 million of Australia's population of 20 million speak a language other than English at home⁷.

Australians enjoy a reputation for being hard working and industrious. Australia's labour relations have improved dramatically in recent years with the number of working days lost per thousand employees declining from 238 per year in 1986 to 26 in 2005, a reduction of 89%⁸. The annual average number of hours worked in Australia is 1,814 hours making Australia the second highest ranked country in the OECD and placing it significantly above the average for G8 countries of 1,664 hours⁹.

Workers' motivation in Australia is high, and considered among the top eleven countries in the world, and second in the region¹⁰. Australians enjoy a good quality of life and consequently Australia ranks among the top ten countries globally in terms of attracting highly skilled foreign professionals¹¹.

Specialist workers in leading ICT fields

Australian labour is highly productive with a well-demonstrated ability to adapt to new challenges. The World Competitiveness Yearbook ranked Australia's workforce sixth in world for flexibility and adaptation to change.

Australia is ranked highly for the availability of IT skills, qualified engineers, and research and development personnel¹².

The ICT sector in Australia employs approximately 371, 150 people in positions right across the economy with almost 92 per cent of these people being employed full-time¹³.

In August 2006 there were 168,900 Computing Professionals and 47,100 IT Managers, or 216,000 ICT Professionals working in Australia¹⁴.

Competitive labour costs

Australia value ads to its labour costs by boasting a highly skilled, multi-lingual work force, a sophisticated financial services sector, highly regarded legal systems and regulatory frameworks and world-class corporate governance systems.

¹ World Competitiveness Yearbook 2006
² 2005, DEST, Students 2005, Selected Higher Education Statistics, Commonwealth of Australia, Canberra, Australia, Summary Analyses
³ Times Higher Education Supplement, 6 October 2006
⁴ Times Higher Education Supplement, 13 October 2006
⁵ Times Higher Education Supplement, 13 October 2006
⁶ World Competitiveness Yearbook 2006
⁷ Australian Bureau of Statistics ABS 2005
⁸ Australian Bureau of Statistics ABS 2006
⁹ OECD 2005
¹⁰ World Competitiveness Yearbook 2006
¹¹ World Competitiveness Yearbook 2006
¹² World Competitiveness Yearbook 2006
¹³ Australian Bureau of Statistics, Labour Force Survey, August 2006
¹⁴ ABS Labour Force Survey, August 2006; DEWR trend data