Australia is officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a sovereign country
comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania,
and numerous smaller islands. It is the largest
country in Oceania and
the world's sixth-largest country by total area.
The population of 26 million is
highly urbanized and heavily concentrated on the eastern seaboard. Australia's
capital is Canberra, and its largest city is Sydney.
The country's other major metropolitan areas are Melbourne, Brisbane, Perth, and Adelaide.
Indigenous Australians inhabited
the continent for about 65,000 years prior to the first arrival of Dutch explorers
in the early 17th century, who named it New Holland. In 1770, Australia's eastern
half was claimed by Great Britain and initially settled through penal transportation to the colony
of New South Wales from 26 January 1788, a
date which became Australia's national day.
The population grew steadily in subsequent decades, and by the time of a
1850s gold rush, most of the continent had been
explored by European settlers and an additional five self-governing crown
colonies established. On 1 January 1901, the six colonies federated, forming the Commonwealth of
Australia. Australia has since maintained a stable liberal
democratic political system that functions as a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy, comprising six states and ten territories.
Australia
is the oldest, flattest, and
driest inhabited continent, with the least fertile soils. It has a
landmass of 7,617,930 square kilometres (2,941,300 sq mi). A mega-diverse
country, its size gives it a wide variety of landscapes, with deserts in the centre, tropical rain-forests in the north-east,
and mountain ranges in
the south-east. Australia generates its income from various sources,
including mining-related exports, telecommunications, banking, manufacturing, and international education.
Australia
is a highly developed country, with the world's fourteenth-largest economy.
It has a high-income economy, with
the world's tenth-highest per capita income.
It is a regional power and has the world's thirteenth-highest military
expenditure. Immigrants account for 30% of the
population, the highest
proportion in any country with a population over 10 million. Having
the sixth-highest Human Development Index and
the eighth-highest ranked democracy globally,
the country ranks highly in
quality of life, health, education, economic
freedom, civil liberties, and political rights, with all its major cities faring exceptionally
in global comparative livability surveys.
Australia is a member of the United Nations, G20, Commonwealth of Nations, ANZUS, Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), World Trade Organization, Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation, Pacific Islands Forum, and the ASEAN Plus Six mechanism.
Religion
Australia has no state religion; section 116 of the Australian constitution prohibits the federal government from making any law to establish any religion, impose any religious observance, or prohibit the free exercise of any religion. in 2016 census, 52.1% of Australians were counted as Christians, including 22.6% as catholic and 13.3% as Anglican; 30.1% of the population reported having no religion; 8.2% identify with non-christian religions, the largest of these being Islam (2.6%), followed by Buddhism (2.4%), Hinduism (1.9%), Sikhism (0.5%) and Judaism (0.4%). the remaining 9.7% of the population did not provide an adequate answer. those who reported having no religion increased conspicuously from 19% in 2006 to 22% in 2011 to 30.1% in 2016.
Economy
A wealthy country, Australia
has a market economy, a high GDP per capita, and a relatively low rate of
poverty. In terms of average wealth, Australia ranked second in the world after
Switzerland from 2013 until 2018. In 2018, Australia overtook Switzerland
and became the country with the highest average wealth. Australia's
poverty rate increased from 10.2% to 11.8%, from 2000/01 to 2013. It was
identified by the Credit Suisse Research Institute as the nation with the
highest median wealth in the world and the second-highest average wealth per
adult in 2013.
The Australian
dollar is the currency for the nation, including Christmas Island, Cocos
(Keeling) Islands, and Norfolk Island, as well as the independent Pacific
Island states of Kiribati, Nauru, and Tuvalu. With the 2006
merger of the Australian Stock Exchange and the Sydney Futures Exchange,
the Australian Securities Exchange became the ninth largest in the
world.
Ranked
fifth in the Index of Economic Freedom (2017), Australia is
the world's 14th largest economy and has the tenth highest per
capita GDP (nominal) at US$55,692. The
country was ranked third in the United Nations 2017 Human Development
Index. Melbourne reached top spot for the fourth year in a row on The
Economist's 2014 list of the world's most livable cities, followed
by Adelaide, Sydney, and Perth in the fifth, seventh, and ninth places
respectively. Total government debt in Australia is about A$190 billion—20%
of GDP in 2010. Australia has among the highest house prices and
some of the highest household debt levels in the world.
