The outlook for regional Australia may rest on ditching the baggage of the past and designing a new future with new attitudes.
Expert in regional and urban economics Professor Tony Sorensen, from the University of New England, believes regional development hinges on harnessing entrepreneurship, raising venture capital, generating ideas and focusing on research and development, but also moving on from the past.
Professor Sorensen will speak at a public seminar at the University of Southern Queensland (USQ) Fraser Coast on Friday, March 16, at 4.30pm.
The seminar is being presented by the Economic Development and Enterprise Collaboration (EDEC), which is part of the USQ Australian Centre for Sustainable Business and Development. Bookings are essential and can be made by phoning Stephanie Bayley at USQ Fraser Coast on 41 94 3113.
Professor Sorensen’s talk is called: Innovation at the periphery: global threats and responses in regional Australia. It will focus on how regions will weather change from the accelerating rate of technological innovation, heightened global competition, demand for development capital, an increasing awareness of environmental threat, the rapidly changing demographics and lifestyle structures, and increasing political stress as governments attempt to walk a tightrope as they try to engineer a seamless economic transition from the past to the future.
Professor Sorensen will look at the strengths and weaknesses of Australia generally and its non-metropolitan regions, specifically in relation to some of the major shifts currently under way.
‘For example, we all know about the mining boom and the rising value of the Australian dollar,’ he said.
‘But how many are aware of the possibility of agriculture joining the resources rush?
‘In this process we may be on the cusp of creating a rural/regional society which, for the first time in 500 years (since the Renaissance), is more wealthy than our major cities.
‘Simultaneously there are many innovative small businesses in rural Australia which might be under stress under current currency alignments, and facing uncertain futures.
‘If rural society faces a cornucopia of threats and opportunities, what do we need to do to minimise the former and optimise the latter.
‘This primarily is a story about engineering a seamless transition from the past, which will shortly be dead and buried, to an almost unimagined portfolio of industries, skills and lifestyles.
‘Looking back over the past 20 years my only thoughts are wow and how the events of the next 20 years are likely to rock our foundations.
‘But the task of managing this transition actively will be highly complex and multi-faceted – a long way from past regional development practice.
‘The usual types of agency may hang around, but the ways in which they go about their task could radically change.
‘Regional development, more than in the past, will be about raising venture capital, focusing on research and development, generating ideas, harnessing entrepreneurship, and creating community cultures anxious to ditch the baggage of the past and design the future.
‘Much of this agenda will involve psychological manipulation of hopes, expectations, action, and interpersonal or inter-institutional engagement.’
Contact Details:
Katrina Corcoran, USQ Media, +61 7 41 94 3167
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