Our Landscape
A wide, brown land
Australia is the sixth
largest country in the world. It's about the same size as the 48
mainland states of the USA and 50 per cent larger than Europe, but has
the lowest population density in the world - only two people per square
kilometre.
Beach paradise
Australia’s coastline stretches
almost 50,000 kilometres and is linked by over 10,000 beaches, more
than any other country in the world. More than 85 per cent of
Australians live within 50 kilometres of the coast, making it an
integral part of our laid-back lifestyle.
Our island home
Australia is the only nation to
govern an entire continent and its outlying islands. The mainland is
the largest island and the world’s smallest, flattest continent.
Our exports
Opals in our eyes
Australia produces 95 per
cent of the world's precious opals and 99 per cent of its black opals.
The world’s opal capital is the quirky underground town of Coober Pedy
in South Australia. The world’s largest opal, weighing 5.27 kilograms,
was found here in 1990.
Gold galore
Kalgoorlie in Western Australia is
Australia's largest producer of gold. It also embraces the world's
largest political electorate, covering a mammoth 2.2 million square
kilometres.
Merinos and cattle calls
Australia's 85.7
million sheep (mostly merinos) produce most of the world's wool. With
25.4 million head of cattle, Australia is also the world's largest
exporter of beef.
Our Record-Breakers
Natural legends
Queensland’s Great Barrier Reef
is home to the world’s largest oyster, weighing up to 3 kilograms,
while the world’s longest earthworm, stretching up to 4 metres, is
found in Gippsland in Victoria. The heaviest crab, weighing up to 14
kilograms, is found in Bass Strait near Tasmania. Australia’s tallest
mountain is Mt Kosciuszko, which is 2,228 metres above sea level.
Longest road, rail and fence
The world’s
longest piece of straight railway track stretches 478 kilometres across
South Australia’s vast, treeless Nullarbor Plain. Australia’s longest
stretch of straight road - 148 kilometres – is on the Eyre Highway in
Western Australia. It’s just a tiny portion of the 2,700 kilometre
sealed road that takes travelers from Perth to Adelaide. The world's
longest continuous fence – the dingo fence – was built to keep sheep
safe from Australia's native dog and runs for 5,531 kilometres through
central Queensland and South Australia.
Our Flora and Fauna
A hopping icon
The iconic kangaroo is unique to
Australia and one of our most easily recognised mammals. There are an
estimated 40 million kangaroos in Australia, more than when Australia
was first settled.
Unique wildlife
Australia developed a unique
fauna when it broke away from the super-continent Gondwana more than 50
million years ago. Today Australia is home to a wealth of wildlife not
found anywhere else in the world. We have around 800 species of birds,
half of which are unique to this country. Our marine environments
contain more than 4,000 fish varieties and tens of thousands of species
of invertebrates, plants and micro-organisms. About 80 per cent of
Australia's southern marine species are found nowhere else in the
world.
Flourishing flora
Australia also supports at
least 25,000 species of plants, compared to 17,500 in Europe. That
includes living fossils like the Wollemi pine and the grass tree, and
brilliant wildflowers. There are over 12,000 species in Western
Australia alone!
Our People and Culture
An ethnic melting pot
Since 1945 more than six
million people from across the world have come to Australia to live.
Today, more than 20 per cent of Australians are foreign born and more
than 40 per cent are of mixed cultural origin. In our homes we speak
226 languages - after English, the most popular are Italian, Greek,
Cantonese and Arabic.
Big country, big ideas
Australians invented
notepads (1902), the surf lifesaving reel (1906), aspirin (1915), the
pacemaker (1926), penicillin (1940) the Hills Hoist clothesline (1946),
the plastic disposable syringe (1949), the wine cask (1965), the bionic
ear (1978), dual-flush toilet flush (1980) anti-counterfeiting
technology for banknotes (1992) and long-wearing contact lenses (1999).
Aboriginal advances
Believed to be the world’s
oldest civilization, Aboriginal people have lived and thrived on this
continent for more than 50,000 years. Aboriginal societies made many
unique advances long before the Europeans arrived. They invented the
aerodynamic boomerang and a type of spear thrower called the woomera.
They were also the first society to ground edges on stone cutting tools
and the first to use stone tools to grind seeds, everyday tools
developed only much later by other societies
