Report confirms Australia’s engineering boom

Demand for engineers in Australia increased by more than 30% between 2006 and 2011 - but not in the sectors one might expect. Engineers Australia recently released a paper, Changes in the Australian Engineering Labour Market, which shows the extent of the national engineering boom.

“Australia’s engineering labour force (those employed directly in engineering work) increased by almost 60,000 engineers between 2006 and 2011,” said Engineers Australia CEO Stephen Durkin.

“The resources boom has clearly gained momentum between the last two censuses with the emergence of major energy, oil and gas projects. Western Australia and the Northern Territory led the charge, with demand for engineers expanding by a staggering 53.5% and 37.5% respectively.”

While the resources sector was a key driver of the increased demand for engineers, the mining sector is only the sixth largest employer of engineers, Durkin said. While this may come as a surprise, the Engineers Australia paper has the figures to prove it: the mining sector employs about 13,500 engineers, compared with 60,654 in the professional services sector, 41,114 in the manufacturing sector and 20,901 in the construction sector.

“Australia produces around 9500 new engineers every year, but this still isn’t enough to meet demand,” Durkin said. “Engineering skills shortages were evident across a range of locations and sectors across the country, and the shortfall has been filled by skilled migration. In 2006, overseas-born engineers made up 48.4% of Australia’s engineering workforce and this increased to 53.9% in 2011.

“This latest paper confirms that engineers remain critical players in Australia’s ambitious nation-building agenda. Engineers and engineering continue to make a huge contribution to our national economy, and these latest data draw attention to the scale of this ongoing contribution,” Durkin said.

The full report is available here.