Investing in regional Australia

Extracts from Michael Chaney's address to the Regional Australia Summit 1999

"If we want to reduce rural poverty, social unrest, regional unemployment, and despair in rural Australia, the most important thing that we must do is to speed up the rate of economic development in country areas.

This requires a higher rate of growth in business investment and capital formation. It requires a faster rate of increase of rural education and human skills. It requires an increased rate of technological progress in rural industries and services... Fortunately there are solutions available that will speed the rate of human capital formation amongst existing farmers.

These rely on investing in further training in such a way that they will generate their own "social capital" and continue the process themselves. The recently reviewed Nuffield Farming Scholarship is an outstanding example. The problem is we are underinvesting in such programs".

Michael Chaney
Managing Director
Wesfarmers Limited