RDA Sydney

Regional Development Australia (Sydney)

Regional Development Australia (RDA) is a national network of Committees made up of local leaders who work with all levels of government, business and community groups to support the economic development of their regions.

Sydney Region Gross Regional Product

Sydney’s economy continues to go from strength to strength. The latest update to RDA Sydney’s Economic Baseline Assessment shows the economy growing at an average annual rate of 2.6% over the 5 years to 2015-16. This is an incredible result given the disruptive forces at work in the domestic and international economies.

RDA Sydney believes ongoing, economic analysis for the “Whole of Sydney” Metropolitan Region is critical for current and future planning and decision making.Particular industry sectors have been at the forefront of this growth. If we classify industry sectors according to the broad categories of industrial, population-serving and knowledge-intensive industries, then it is evident that the highest growth in both absolute and proportional terms comes from the knowledge-intensive industries. A staggering 44% of Sydney’s gross value add comes from these industries, growing at 4.3% p.a. over the past 5 years.

Of these knowledge-intensive industries, financial and insurance services followed by professional, scientific and technical services are the strongest in terms of absolute value. These industries are primarily clustered around the Sydney CBD and northern Sydney, driven by the benefits of agglomeration.

The industrial sector shows mixed results with manufacturing declining in terms of gross value added by 3.0% p.a. over the past 5 years. This is consistent with long-term trends in manufacturing but, arguably, is also influenced by certain service aspects of the sector being sourced out to the services sector rather than being conducted in-house. Wholesale trade has also grown strongly over the past 5 years with growth of 3.2% p.a.

Population-serving industries have shown an overall growth of 2.8% p.a., higher than the population growth rate of 1.7% and driven by construction, retail trade and health care.