The latest population figures for Australia includes the March–June 2020 quarter, giving us a key insight into how the pandemic is affecting population changes. In this blog, Glenn breaks down the figures from the ABS, demonstrating how we can now understand the impact of COVID-19 across the states and territories.

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The June quarter 2020 population figures for Australia have been released by the ABS and they paint an interesting picture of what we can expect for population growth post-COVID.

For the financial year 2019–20, Australia’s population grew by 1.27%, to stand at 25,657,749. This was a growth in absolute terms of 321,296 people. This figure is actually quite high compared to the long-term average, though in percentage terms this is the lowest annual growth rate since 2005. That was the last year that Australia’s population did not grow by at least 300,000 people, and represented the start of the population boom which has continued for 15 years, driven by high births and overseas migration.

Impact of COVID-19 on Australia population growth

Though lower than we are used to, 1.27% doesn’t seem spectacularly low. But the devil is in the detail: only the final quarter of this financial year is really after the pandemic took hold. The international borders shut in mid-March, though there were some countries excluded before that. So the period March 2020 to June 2020 is the best indication of what’s really happening at the moment.

In that quarter, Australia’s population only grew by 29,292 people, or 0.11%. This is the lowest quarterly growth since the ABS started producing quarterly estimates in 1981. It translates into an annual increase of about 0.45%. If that is borne out for a whole year (and with the Coronavirus running rampant worldwide, there are no signs of the borders opening en masse any time soon), it would be the nation’s lowest annual growth rate since the population declined in 1916 due to the huge loss of life of soldiers sent to fight in World War I. This slowdown is much more significant than the annual number really shows.

The main driver of this change was, of course, a drop in overseas migration. Typically this makes up about two-thirds of Australia’s population growth, and over the course of the year it still comprised 57% of total growth. But in the last quarter, it went negative: for the first time in at least 40 years, more people left Australia long-term than arrived to settle in Australia. We did have 13,700 long-term arrivals in that quarter (with the borders closed, I’m not sure how that happened), but we had 19,600 departures, so a net emigration rather than immigration.

Changes by state and territory

This is how the figures stack up at the state and territory level. I’ve separated out the quarterly from the annual numbers to show the difference.

State/Territory	Population June 2019	Population March 2020	Population June 2020	Change 1-year	Change 1-year %	Change Quarter (Mar-June)	Change Quarter (Mar-June %)
NSW	8,087,379	8,160,113	8,164,128	76,749	0.95%	4,015	0.05%
Vic	6,596,880	6,690,180	6,694,884	98,004	1.49%	4,704	0.07%
Qld	5,093,884	5,161,409	5,174,437	80,553	1.58%	13,028	0.25%
SA	1,752,681	1,768,045	1,769,319	16,638	0.95%	1,274	0.07%
WA	2,623,259	2,658,135	2,661,936	38,677	1.47%	3,801	0.14%
Tas	534,575	539,732	540,569	5,994	1.12%	837	0.16%
NT	246,143	245,522	245,980	163	-0.07%	458	0.19%
ACT	426,285	429,941	431,114	4,829	1.13%	1,173	0.27%
Australia total	25,365,745	25,657,749	25,687,041	321,296	1.27%	29,292	0.11%

^{Source: Australian Bureau of Statistics: National, State and Territory Population, June 2020}

Here are some of the highlights for each state and territory.

Victoria

Victoria has lost its crown as the fastest growing state (on an annual basis), which it has held for the past 6 years. Growth annually in Victoria was still quite high, at 1.49%, just behind Queensland’s 1.58%, but the quarterly growth is tiny – just 0.07%. This is due to a double whammy of negative overseas migration and negative quarterly interstate migration (-3,042 people in the quarter). While on an annual basis there was still a small net inflow to the state, the quarterly outflow in June is the first one Victoria has seen since 2008, and the largest since 1996. So Victoria is now growing only by natural increase. And it’s worth mentioning that these figures from June pre-date the second lockdown in Melbourne.

New South Wales

NSW has also seen a collapse in population growth, now under 1% for the year, and at 0.05% in the March–June quarter,  the slowest of any state. As the state most reliant on overseas migration, NSW always loses population interstate, mainly to Queensland, and that trend continues as it has for many years.

Queensland

Queensland continues to grow strongly in the last quarter of 2019–20. The state’s quarterly growth of 0.25%  makes it the only state still above 1% growth on an annualised basis. This was entirely due to strong interstate migation, which appears to have continued unchanged through the pandemic. For the year, Queensland had a net interstate migration of over 25,000 people, mainly coming from NSW and Victoria. For the June Quarter 2020, Queensland made up almost half (44%) of all Australia’s population growth.

Australian Capital Territory

The ACT seems largely unaffected by the pandemic, being the only jurisdiction to have a quarterly increase generally in line with their annual rate; 0.27% for the quarter, 1.13% for the year.

Western Australia

WA continues its return to growth. Although the quarterly growth is very subdued in the West and overseas migration is down (as it is everywhere) in the last quarter, annual growth is 1.47%, which is the highest it’s been for 6 years. WA seems to have been more affected by 2014–15’s end of the mining boom than it has been by COVID-19 in a population sense.

Tasmania

Tasmania continues to grow modestly, gaining interstate migrants, though growth is slower than in the last few years. This is a continuation of the existing trend in the island state.

Northern Territory

The Northern Territory – being completely contrarian – continued its population decline on an annual basis, but in the last quarter managed a population increase bigger in percentage terms than all the states except Queensland. Of course it’s a small population to start with, so a quarterly percentage increase of 0.19% equates only to 458 people – still it’s an increase!

South Australia

My favourite stat out of these numbers has to be in South Australia. Though the quarterly growth is down there in line with the national trend, SA was the only state to record a positive net overseas migration in June 2020 (albeit only +82 people), making it the migration capital of Australia for the quarter! Not only that, but South Australia, which consistently loses population interstate, just recorded its first positive quarter of interstate migration since 1992. At 104 people, the actual figure was again quite small, but in a typical quarter SA loses 1,000 people interstate, so it’s quite a turnaround.

Local population impacts from COVID-19

So it certainly appears that, looking behind the numbers, the pandemic is having a major impact on Australia’s population growth, an turning some long established trends around. The ABS has also written a supplementary article about observed effects from COVID-19.

Of course we’re all keen to see how the pandemic is affecting local areas. For this we have to wait a little longer – Local Government Area and SA2 population estimates for June 2020 are released in late March, and we’ll get them loaded onto the .id sites very soon after that. In the meantime, our forecasters are working out what this means in the long-term for each local area. You can read some of their ideas here.

As always, contact us if you have any population related queries – demographics@id.com.au