THE IMPACT OF ROBOTICS ON AUSTRALIA
According to the Australian Productivity Commission, the key to improving Australia’s productivity lies in applying new knowledge and technologies.
The Australian Economy
Australia is one of the world’s richest nations. Living standards and educational levels are high, borrowing costs, inflation and unemployment are low while we are living longer and, in general, healthier lives than in the past. To maintain our current standard of living, we need our productivity to grow 2.5% a year.
With labour productivity consistently 1.8% per year we rely on new technologies such as robotics to fill the productivity gap. If Australian firms embrace automation at the same rate as our peers we can increase productivity growth by over 50%.
In this roadmap we focus on the main sectors of the Australian economy impacted by automation: Resources, Manufacturing, Healthcare, Services, Defence, Infrastructure, and Agriculture, the Environment and Space. There is a contrast between those industries mature in the adoption of robotics versus those still exploring. The least mature market sectors are most likely to see disruptive changes. Even allowing for that, the take-up of automation will be uneven, depending on the investment capacity of industry participants, their appetite for change and the behaviour of competitors. That unevenness is reflected in this roadmap, which recognises there is no one-size-fits-all approach to industry transformation.
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