This post provides a brief overview of the new resources available from our economics team to help you understand the impact of Covid-19 on your local economy.

Our economics team have now released new information about the economic impacts of COVID-19 for local and regional areas.

This is aimed at supporting decision-makers to:

• Identify which parts of local economies have experienced the greatest impacts
• Support applications for grants, funding and new infrastructure
• Review & update existing strategy & policy
• Prepare for the recovery with economic data and an evidence-based approach

The new data includes forecast estimates for the following:

• Gross Regional Product (GRP)
• Jobs
• Industry change
• Employed residents
• The impact of Job Seeker and other stimulus packages
• Comparison to regional, state and national benchmarks.

Find these forecasts for your area

The tool is LIVE now and can be viewed for hundreds of local and regional areas across Australia.

The outlook module can be found in our economic profiles (economy.id) under the ‘Economic tools’ menu.

See a screenshot below from the economic profile for Inner West:

To find the outlook for your area

1. Register here for access to our entire collection of economic profiles for local government areas across Australia.
2. Once you have registered, you will be taken to a directory of all our local community profiles, where you can search for your area.

Or, preview the tool using one of the following examples.

• For an Inner City example go to – Inner West Sydney
• For a Growth Area go to – City of Wyndham in Melbourne.
• For a Regional City go to – Townsville in Queensland.
• For a Rural Region go to – Whyalla and Eyre Peninsula in South Australia
• For a Small Rural Population  go to – Break O’Day Council area in Tasmania
• For a Resources area go to – Port Hedland in Western Australia

These forecasts will be updated as new data and other information is released.