Manufacturing is currently generating lots of media coverage. This is important as the community needs to become engaged in the debate and to participate in deciding what type of economic mix Australia has in the future.
We have seen the past Prime Minister Paul Keating highlighting that Australia needs a message and a strategy for future economic development. Meanwhile Lindsay Fox has warned that the eastern states are gradually becoming a “rust-bucket” as traditional manufacturing gets reamed out by the strong dollar.
What is clear to all the participants in the AMCRC is that Australia’s high-tech sectors will drive the future of Australian-based manufacturing. Furthermore they see innovation in products and processes as more valuable to the long-term competitiveness of Australian manufacturing than cost-cutting.
