preview

Australia Essays

Good Essays

Australia- Trade and Immigration Background As Joycelyn has mentioned Australia's having greater and greater interaction with its Asian neighbours, through the areas of trade and its active role in the regional trade organization -
APEC. Despite its location, Australia can hardly be thought of being an Asian country. Not so long ago, Asian were looked down upon, with a mixture of fear because of the communist aggression, pity because of their poverty, and contempt, as they dumped cheap and poorly made products to do Australian workers out of job. For decades, high prohibitive tariffs blocked the imports of Asian goods, and a
'White Australia' policy fenced off Asian migrants. However, the situation is reversed in the past 2 decades. With …show more content…

And Australia has found it hard to dismantle the barriers to processed minerals and food in the Asian markets, and this impedes their development of value-adding industries and job creation. But from the Asia's pt of view,
Australia's tiny population of 17 M means little to the Asian giants, for example when compared to Indonesia's 180 M.
A qoute from the Malaysian Info minister, 'Australia depends on Asia and not the other way around.' may reflects
Australia's position, at least this is the way the Asians see it.
Immigration (See Overhead - Immigration) Another sign of
Australia's willingness to open is its generous immigration policy. The # admitted stayed over 100,000 in the 80s, but was cut back to 80,000 in 92. Most of them were from
Asia. Besides the categories of family reunion and refugee,
Australia, like Canada, also attracted hundred of thousands of skilled or business immigrants from Hong Kong where people fled as the Chinese takeover approaches. These people brought in an enormous amt of capital, and also initiated a boom in the real estate market. The proportion of
Australian with Asian origins are expected to increase to 7% in 2000, as compared to 4% now. Most Australians feel uneasy about this sudden change in the ethnic mixtures of their countries, and opposing voices are high. The unemployment figure is double digit already, and most of the immigrants are unskilled since they were admitted for having relations in Australia. New policies call for

Get Access