WHAT IS PLACE-BASED ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT, WHAT IMPACT DOES IT HAVE AND WHY IS IT KEY TO AUSTRALIA’ S PRODUCTIVITY? Economic development in Australia is based on the concept of building the economic capacity of a place in order to deliver improved outcomes for the community. Having long been considered a national-level process, the scale of economic development has evolved from being a purely national level approach to one that is often planned and executed at a regional, sub-regional and local scale( place). This has led to the increased involvement of governments, especially local government, in determining where economic development is required in place, how it is enabled and the outcomes it is trying to achieve.
Economic Developers are the professionals working as‘ bridge builders’ in the community to ensure authentic engagement across the community, including with First Nations groups, to achieve the social licence required for net zero transition.
NET ZERO TRANSFORMATION The Australian Government has announced ambitious aspirations to maximise opportunities as we move to net zero and secure Australia’ s place in a changing global environment. There are a number of commendable programs contributing to the Government’ s productivity agenda and no doubt, more will be proposed through the Economic Reform Roundtable process. A missing element is unbiased, impactful coordination in the application of economic policy in Australia’ s communities. The missing piece is place.
Economic development( especially that led by local governments) is considered part of sustainable development which considers environmental impacts and community outcomes such as quality of life, quality of place, equity and inclusion. As such, economic development increasingly needs to align with community needs and wants in a locality or region.
Critically, economic development has most impact where there is partnership between different levels of government and other organisations to enable effective and efficient outcomes. This connectivity has been lacking in Australia and has impacted competitiveness and productivity which relies so heavily on linked up policy across all levels of government. EDA can play an impactful role, with Government as a connecting force for these activities.
Economic development activities vary in response to local, and sometimes sub-regional or regional, characteristics. They also vary depending on which type of government or non-government organisation is delivering the activities. This scope and scale continuum is very much influenced by the history of a place and the ambition for its future.
There is no one size fits all to place-based economic development and as such, EDA’ s membership base, working in cities and regions, at the grass roots level can provide intelligence to the Australian Government to support the productivity agenda.
The recent Australia-first research commissioned by EDA found that all levels of government have a significant role to play in economic development, both in terms of their ability to influence macroeconomic variables which impact on business investment and also in terms of funding economic development activities.
These activities can be separated into strategic activities( such as visitor economy, business and investment attraction or land use and infrastructure planning) and enabling activities( such as advocacy, research and analysis, local business support and marketing and promotion).
IMPACT OF THE ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT SECTOR Economic development activities at all levels of government can generate enduring economic benefits for local communities. For every $ 1 spent on economic development, there will be an enduring local benefit of between $ 3.94 and $ 4.12 regardless of the level of government investing in the local community, and a range of job creation impacts depending on the level of government and the location of local government.
This is shown in Figure 1. Estimated impact of the economic development sector in Australia.
Figure 1. Estimated impact of the economic development sector in Australia.
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