Community Capacity – Background Information

Economy

The Northern Agricultural Region (NAR) has a rich history of agriculture and fishing. Broadacre farming is the primary land use. Mining and tourism are also influential industries in the region, employing large numbers of people locally.

Just over half of NAR residents are employed (54%, Australian Bureau of Statistics 2016). A third (32.5%) are outside of the workforce, e.g. retired people and students, and the unemployment rate is around 4%. Outside of the Greater Geraldton area, agriculture (including fisheries) employs the most people throughout the region. Residents of the region are also employed in mining, construction, and a range service industries including health care, retail, education, hospitality, public administration, and logistics (ABS 2016).

Agriculture

Agricultural production in Western Australia is worth $10.7 billion a year and relies largely on the production of wheat, barley, oats, canola, wool, and cattle (DAWE 2020).

The NAR covers around 7.5 million hectares, of which ~70% is utilised for agricultural production. Agriculture in the NAR contributed ~$2.5 billion towards the WA total in 2017/18 (ABS 2020) – mostly from broadacre crops. Horticultural products like fruit, vegetables, and cut flowers contributed ~$134 million and livestock production for meat, milk, and wool contributed ~$410 million.

Fishing

The fishing industry in Western Australia includes both aquaculture and wild-harvested seafood and is worth approximately $634 million a year (DAWE 2020). This figure refers to the gross value of production (GVP), excluding indirect economic value generated by fisheries along their supply chains.

The coastline and islands of the NAR falls within the West Coast Bioregion (DPIRD 2019), where the principal commercial fisheries are the very valuable Western Rock Lobster and the West Coast Demersal Scalefish Resource. Smaller fisheries in the region include a growing number of Octopus fisheries, and there is a lot of recreational fishing along the coast.  

General fisheries data are not available at the scale of the NAR coastline but the GVP of WA wild-catch fisheries was $554.5 million in 2017/2018, a 5% increase on the previous year. The Western Rock Lobster catch contributes ~80% of the total wild caught production value (DAWE 2020), and 31% of all Western Rock Lobster are caught along the NAR coast (Rock Lobster Report 2017). The Western Rock Lobster fishery generates almost $50 million for the Geraldton economy, accounting for 24% of the total economic activity in the city.

Aquaculture activities include marine algae production at Hutt Lagoon and the scallop and black pearl oyster fisheries at the Abrolhos Islands. The real value of Western Australian aquaculture has declined by almost 50% over the past decade, mostly due to a reduction in the value of Pearl Oyster production (DAWE 2020). A Mid West Aquaculture Development Zone was established in 2017, located across an area of open water between Geraldton and the southern Houtman Abrolhos Islands, and there is potential for a growing number of aquaculture ventures to establish there.

Mining

The mining industry in Western Australia is worth $172 billion a year, with sales of iron ore accounting for around 60% of this total (DMIRS 2020).

The resources extracted in the NAR include oil and gas, mineral sands, talc, construction materials and iron ore. The mining industry has rapidly expanded and now covers over 200 operating mine sites (MINEDEX 2020). Mining contributes approximately $1.5 billion a year to the local economy.

Tourism

The tourism industry in Western Australia is worth $12.9 billion a year. Tourism is also a rapidly expanding sector in the NAR, particularly along the coast, and is worth at least $505 million a year (Tourism Research Australia 2019).

Some of the State’s most exciting nature tourism attractions are located in the NAR, including the Pinnacles, New Norcia, Kalbarri, Murchison River Gorges, Wildflower Country, the Houtman Abrolhos Islands and the Batavia Coast.