The Australian education sector and the economic contribution of international students

This report is the first of its kind to synthesise all available data on the economic contribution of international students to the Australian economy. It focuses on the economic contribution of the Australian export market, Australia’s standing in the international education export market, the characteristics of the domestic education sector and the success rates of international students in attaining Australian residency and citizenship. It found that Australia’s export education industry grew 42 per cent in the three years to 2008, employs 126,000 people and contributes 1per cent of the nation’s gross domestic product. Other findings include: the total impact of the export industry on the economy, once the ‘value-added’ effect of $12.6 billion is added to direct expenditure by overseas students and their families of $14.1 billion, exceeds $26.7 million confirming the education sector as the nation’s third biggest export earner behind coal and iron ore, outperforming travel, services (professional, business and technical), as well as exports of gold, crude petroleum and aluminium; higher education has experienced relatively slow growth over recent years, with enrolments expanding by 7.7 per cent between 2006 and 2008 suggesting that the sector has reached a mature growth phase compared with other sectors of the education market; the English Language Intensive Courses for Overseas Students (ELICOS) and the vocational education and training (VET) sectors experienced an upsurge in growth over the same period, with enrolments increasing by 63.7 and 112.6 per cent, respectively; a prediction that a 5 per cent reduction in overseas student numbers would cause 6300 Australians to lose their jobs as the economy lost more than $600 million in export revenue; Australian education providers also earned $438 million from overseas campuses and consultancy services, bringing total income for the sector to $14.1 billion; and Australia, with less than 1 per cent of the world’s population, enrolled 7.5 per cent of the world’s international students. Show less