Queensland’s services sector represents approximately 68% of our economy in 2002, less than Australia at 71% and the OECD at 72%. In 2005, the total services sector (i.e. knowledge- and non-knowledge intensive activities) contributed approximately 70% to Queensland’s Gross State Product (GSP), behind only the ACT (89%), NSW (77%) and Victoria (73%). These shares are roughly equivalent to the size of the overall services sectors in other OECD countries, as shown in Figure 1.
Figure 1: Services, Industry, Construction and Agricultural industries as a Percentage of Gross Domestic / State Product (2002)54
However, looking at the composition of services within the Queensland economy tells quite a different story. In 2004/05, only 24% of all services activities within Queensland were knowledge-intensive, compared to 31% on average for Australia and 33% and 35% for Victoria and NSW respectively (excluding health and education in all cases).
Ignoring the relative size of services shares overall (which can distort comparisons between the absolute size of KIS sectors), Figure 2 shows that knowledge-intensive market services contributed just over 16% to GSP in Queensland in 2002, compared to the OECD average of 20% and an Australian average of 22%.
Figure 2: Knowledge Intensive Market Services as a percentage of Gross Domestic / State Product (2002)55
In 2004/05, knowledge-intensive market services continued to contribute less to Queensland’s total economic output compared to the rest of Australia across all major categories, as shown in Table 1.
|
Queensland |
Australia |
Post and Telecommunications |
2.86% |
3.04% |
Finance and Insurance |
5.71% |
8.55% |
Business Services |
8.38% |
10.53% |
Total |
16.95% |
22.12% |
Table 1: Percentage of GSP/GDP contributed by Knowledge-Intensive Market Services, 2004-0556
The biggest discrepancy in the share of knowledge-intensive services contribution in Queensland compared to the rest of Australia is in finance and insurance, where Queensland has an especially small concentration of deposit-taking financiers and providers of services to insurance. Within the business services category, Queensland has relatively small contributors in mining exploration, scientific research, computer services, and marketing / business management services compared to the rest of Australia, but a relatively strong concentration in machinery/equipment hiring and leasing.
From 1996/97 to 2004/05, business services grew strongly in Queensland at an average annual rate of 8.42% compared to 6.59% in the rest of Australia. In the same period, Queensland’s finance and insurance services grew at 8.64% on average per year, however this was outstripped by average annual growth in financial and insurance services in the rest of Australia in this period of 10.21%.
Reflecting the dominance of mining and agricultural exports in Australia, the contribution to Australia’s total exports from the services sector was 22% in 2004, above the 20% share of services in total exports from the European Union in the same period but below the 34% and 28% services share of exports from the United Kingdom and the United States respectively.
Within Australian jurisdictions, there is a very wide distribution of the services share in total exports, as would be expected when the diverse nature of State and Territory economies is taken into account. In 2004/05, fully 100%of the ACT’s exports were services-based, compared to 6% in Tasmania and 7% in WA. Queensland’s services sector contributed 20% to total exports in that period, around the same as the national average of 22% but well below the share contributed by the services sectors in NSW (41%) and Victoria (31%).
While Queensland’s share of services in total exports is around the national average, as shown in Table 2, Queensland has the third lowest proportion of knowledge-intensive services exports as a proportion of total exports compared to all other Australian States and Territories. 57
|
2000-01 |
2001-02 |
2002-03 |
2003-04 |
2004-05 |
ACT |
82.1% |
83.9% |
86.7% |
86.0% |
84.6% |
NSW |
19.5% |
18.1% |
21.1% |
22.5% |
20.6% |
VIC |
10.9% |
11.7% |
14.2% |
14.7% |
15.3% |
NT |
6.7% |
9.4% |
9.6% |
12.4% |
11.4% |
Australia |
9.3% |
9.1% |
10.2% |
10.9% |
10.0% |
SA |
5.8% |
5.8% |
6.5% |
7.0% |
7.2% |
QLD |
4.2% |
4.3% |
5.2% |
5.3% |
4.5% |
TAS |
2.8% |
3.1% |
3.2% |
3.3% |
3.2% |
WA |
2.3% |
2.7% |
2.7% |
2.7% |
2.3% |
Table 2: Knowledge-Intensive Service Exports as a % of Total Exports
While these statistics do not provide a complete insight into ‘smart services’ in Queensland because they are based on the current industry classification system, they do suggest the following: