Australia has a significant opportunity to create and retain high-quality jobs, grow its manufacturing sector and reshore
capabilities lost to imports, through a carefully managed transition to low emissions manufacturing.
Doing so is fundamentally in the national interest.
Low emissions manufacturing investment is particularly important in an Australian context: it will help to balance the
Australian economy and offset some of the uncertainty facing Australia’s largest resources exports in an emissions constrained world.
The opportunity is real because of Australia’s potential for natural and enduring competitive advantages in clean energy resources, technologies and capabilities, alongside its strengths in energy-intensive manufacturing industries.
Leveraging one to enable the other is essential.
Manufacturing Australia has partnered with the global strategy firm L.E.K. Consulting to create a perspectives paper, examining two separate but related topics; these sections can be read independently or together:
1. The economic, social and strategic importance of Australia’s manufacturing capabilities
2. The opportunities and challenges of decarbonising Australian manufacturing.
