A milestone, transformational report endorsed by the Mandurah Council last month will guide the way forward in diversifying Mandurah’s economy, and highlights opportunities in creating a better future for Mandurah.
The ‘Transform Mandurah Economic Opportunities’ report outlines the city’s long-term socio-economic challenges and presents key opportunities for a strong and resilient path ahead.
The report lays out Mandurah’s fundamental structural challenges of the past 20-30 years, providing the City of Mandurah and Council with a comprehensive baseline from which to confidently address Mandurah’s toughest issues over the next decade. The report was jointly commissioned by the WA State Government through the Peel Development Commission.
This economic analysis was undertaken to support Transform Mandurah economic development strategy. Transform Mandurah is a program of projects focused on economic diversification, revitalisation and community capacity building designed to transform the economy and improve education and employment opportunities for residents in Mandurah.
This analysis identified Mandurah’s existing economic advantages and disadvantages, relevant global drivers likely to influence change, and future economic opportunities for Mandurah.
The challenges include Mandurah’s unemployment rate, which for the past 20 years has remained two to three percent higher than the Perth metropolitan area, demonstrating local structural economic disadvantages and differences.
The research also shows that just 12 percent of Mandurah’s workforce has a university qualification, compared to 26 percent in the greater Perth region, highlighting the need for stronger education pathways and improved education outcomes.
Despite these challenges, Mayor Williams said the City and Council are keen to tackle the issues head on, and embrace Mandurah’s abundance of opportunities on the horizon.
“As a city that has experienced immense population growth over the past three decades, a number of challenges relating to employment, housing, economy and education have presented themselves,” he said.
“While delivering some stark statistics, encouragingly, this report has drilled down and given us a much deeper understanding of our problems, giving us a reliable basis of where we are and where we want to be,” he said.
“The data in this report is not new to us, but it has identified exactly what the issues are, where they are and how to address them. It provides a great platform to narrow our focus, stare down the significant challenges and create real and meaningful change over the next 10 years. It’s an exciting time to consider what prospects we have and embrace further opportunities that may present themselves down the track.”
There is some really positive momentum in Mandurah right now, all geared towards diversifying the economy and creating a bright future for generations to come.
The Transform Mandurah report has identified eight key economic opportunities that fit with Mandurah’s strengths, and are designed to increase economic growth over the next 10 years. It also acknowledges that Mandurah needs investment, intervention and support from Government to overcome the challenges and maximise the opportunities. Partnerships with the private sector is also vital.
The City and Council will now develop a shortlist of priority projects in line with the eight opportunities identified in this report. These projects will be aimed at diversifying the local economy and reducing structural unemployment over the next 10 years. This list will be presented back to Council for consideration later this year.
For more information about Transform Mandurah and the Transform Mandurah Economic Opportunities report, go to https://www.mandurah.wa.gov.au/transform-mandurah
