Australia, New South Wales - Overview:
New South Wales covers an area of over 800,000 kilometres on the East Coast of Australia, bordered by Queensland to the north, Victoria to the south and South Australia to the West. Official estimates for 2000 put the population of New South Wales at approximately 6.5 million people, the vast majority of which live in the state capital of Sydney. The region is extremely multicultural and, according to the Department of State and Regional Development, has the largest number of migrants of any state in Australia.

Economy:
New South Wales is one of the Asia Pacific's most competitive business centres and has a diverse economy with strengths in a broad range of sectors. According to the Department of State and Regional Development, the state's GDP is approximately $212 billion and unemployment has been falling steadily since the middle of the 1990s. Figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics put unemployment at 6.1 per cent for both males and females in September 2001.

Finance and business services are vital to the region's economy, accounting for 23 per cent of Gross State Product in 2000-2001. The vast majority of companies operating in these fields are located in Sydney and include Citibank, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs, HSBC Bank, Mastercard International and the Royal Bank of Canada. New South Wales also has the 17th largest information and communication technology industry in the world in terms of total revenue, with nearly two thirds of the top 250 ICT companies in Australia having their headquarters there.

The region has flourishing biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries that are strongly supported by the state government. Some 40 per cent of biotechnology companies and 80 per cent of pharmaceutical companies operating in Australia are based in New South Wales and together these industries employ more than 10,000 people in the region.

The defence and aerospace industry contributes about 6 per cent to the Gross State Product and is one of New South Wales' fastest growing sectors. Some of the major international companies based in the state include Australian Defence Industries, Qantas, Rockwell Australia, Tenix and Thales Group.

Approximately a third of Australia's manufacturing output is generated in New South Wales accounting for about 13.5 per cent of the state's income between 1999-2000. Employment in this sector as of February 2002 stood at just under 343,000, which is just over 11 per cent of the total workforce in the state. The majority of employment was in the manufacture of machinery and equipment, metal products, food, beverages and tobacco, printing, publishing and recorded media. New South Wales is also home to a major textiles, clothing and footwear industry, with some 2,000 companies responsible for about 35 per cent of the Australian industry.

Workforce:
The state benefits from a large and well educated workforce. According to the Department of State and Regional Development, more than half the region's workforce has completed post-school qualifications, including 21 per cent with bachelor degrees or higher degrees. Furthermore, 45 per cent of the country's Asian language speakers and 29 per cent of its European language speakers are resident in Sydney.

Infrastructure:
The region benefits from a good transport infrastructure that connects all the principle metropolitan areas and production centres. The extensive and well maintained road network is comprised of approximately 200,000 kilometres of roads, 36,000 kilometres of which are main roads and highways. The state rail system carries about 30 per cent of all Australian freight and provides regular and reliable services.

There are five main ports located in the New South Wales region providing excellent shipping links to the rest of the world. Eden Port is located approximately 230 nautical miles south of Sydney and has facilities for handling a variety of cargo including Petroleum, Dry bulk and Containers. The ports principle imports include frozen fish and petroleum oil, whilst its main export is woodchips. Newcastle is a river port and is one of the country's major bulk export ports, handling more than 77 million tonnes of cargo per annum. Some 80 per cent of this cargo is comprised of coal, making the port the largest coal port in the world. Port Kembla is a specialist industrial port that handles in the region of 25 million tonnes of cargo a year, just under two thirds of which is exports. The major commodities dealt with at the port include coal, iron ore, steel products, grain and pine logs. Sydney Harbour's port facilities handle a wide range of vessels and cargoes, including dry bulk, general cargo and containers. Sydney Harbour is also the South Pacific's leading destination for cruise shipping and handles in excess of 100,000 travellers each year. The Port of Yamba is the eastern most port in Australia handling a range of imports and exports for the Northern Rivers District of New South Wales. The second largest fishing fleet in the state is also based there.

Air services are available from most towns and cities throughout New South Wales. Sydney Airport is Australia's main airport and handles the majority of airfreight passenger activity in the region. There are 32 international and 7 domestic airlines in operation at the airport and, as of July 2001, some 259 flights departed from Sydney to Asia each week.

Quality of Life:
New South Wales is the most geographically diverse state in Australia, with a landscape that ranges from a subtropical north to snow capped mountains in the south. There is also in excess of 1300 kilometres of coastline boasting some fantastic beaches. Further inland the climate becomes hotter and drier.

The cost of living in New South Wales is very competitive when compared with other areas in the Asia Pacific region. In a survey conducted by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) in 2001, Sydney was ranked 72nd most expensive for cost of living out of 133 cities around the world, below Hong Kong, Singapore and Tokyo.

In Mercer's quality of life survey for 2002, Sydney was ranked joint fourth with Geneva on 105.5 points, just behind the 1st placed city of Zurich on 106.5 points. The survey looked 39 distinct criteria covering political, social, economic, and environmental factors of the cities.

Business Costs:
According to a report published in January 2002 by DTZ, one of the world's leading real estate advisory companies, office occupancy costs in Sydney compare favourably with several other major business centres in the Asia Pacific Region. In central Tokyo, total office occupancy costs were calculated to be $99.50 (USD), while they were $74.80 in Hong Kong, $45.80 in Taipei, $43.80 in Seoul and $42.50 in Singapore. In Sydney the cost was just $33.10 per square foot per annum.

Wage costs in New South Wales are also extremely competitive. Figures published by William M. Mercer Cullen Egan Dell in January 2002, show average salary packages in Sydney, for employees with degree qualifications and approximately five years experience, to be comparable to those paid in Taipei and Singapore across a number of job categories, including IT, finance and engineering. Furthermore, they are considerably lower than those paid in Tokyo and Hong Kong and, in some cases, almost half.