The ACRI Podcast Australia-China Relations Institute

UTS:ACRI research report 'Australia's export mix, industrial base and economic resilience challenge': https://bit.ly/3q3cn1Y

An explainer of 'Australia's export mix, industrial base and economic resilience challenge', a research report by the Australia-China Relations Institute at the University of Technology Sydney comparing Australia’s export basket and industrial base with peer economies over time in order to assess the extent of the economic resilience challenge that Australia stands to face.

The report was commissioned by the Business Council of Australia (BCA) and is authored by Professor James Laurenceson, UTS:ACRI Director; Thomas Pantle, UTS:ACRI researcher; Dr Phillip Toner, UTS Business School Adjunct Professor; and Professor Roy Green, UTS Special Innovation Advisor and former UTS Business School Dean.

UTS:ACRI working paper 'Australia’s export exposure to China: Assessing the costs of disruption': https://bit.ly/3DVzfFj

An explainer of 'Australia's export exposure to China: Assessing the costs of disruption', a working paper by the Australia-China Relations Institute at the University of Technology Sydney which provides the most comprehensive assessment to date of the extent to which Australia’s export exposure to the People’s Republic of China (PRC) gives Beijing leverage that threatens Canberra’s sovereignty. The paper compares Australia’s aggregate exposure to its top market with seven other ‘peer’ economies, and provides a guide to the costs that Australian producers of 12 goods have suffered after Beijing disrupted their access to the PRC market starting in May 2020.

In this episode of the UTS:ACRI Podcast’s new series delivering analysis of COVID-19 and its impacts within the context of the Australia-China relationship, UTS:ACRI Director Professor James Laurenceson is joined by Professor Xie Tao, Dean of the School of International Relations and Diplomacy at Beijing Foreign Studies University and UTS:ACRI Adjunct Professor, to discuss the potential impacts of COVID-19 on the US-China relationship, Australia’s geopolitical environment and the Australia-China relationship.

In this episode of the UTS:ACRI Podcast’s new series delivering analysis of COVID-19 and its impacts within the context of the Australia-China relationship, UTS:ACRI Director Professor James Laurenceson is joined by Dr Jeffrey Wilson, Research Director at the Perth USAsia Centre and a specialist in the regional economic integration of the Indo-Pacific, to discuss the implications of COVID-19 for Australian imports, integration with global supply-chains and its foreign investment environment.

As the unprecedented public health impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic continue to permeate into both daily life and the broader currents of international affairs, it is clear that what began as an outbreak of a novel coronavirus in mainland China has mutated into a globalised ‘grey rhino’ event with significant second-order implications for the Australia-China relationship. In this special edition of the UTS:ACRI Podcast, UTS:ACRI Director Professor James Laurenceson discusses these implications amid concerns around the Australia-China economic relationship, which now sees exports to mainland China accounting for seven percent of Australia’s GDP.

An important piece of context is that despite political and diplomatic tensions, goods exports to mainland China in the year to January 2020 reached $150 billion. This was up 26 percent on the year to January 2019, with services exports growing by eight percent over the same period. This means that negative economic effects will be coming off a high base.

Nonetheless, there is no doubt that mainland China’s economy has been subject to significant disruption since January. While forecasting currently projects a severe contraction in the first quarter of 2020, the mainland Chinese economy is expected to recover to 4.5 percent GDP growth by December, a 1.5 percentage point decrease compared to the previous year. However, a weaker recovery cannot be ruled out, with some forecasts predicting much lower growth.

Testifying to this are official data from the People’s Republic of China (PRC) government such as purchasing manager’s indexes – measures of business sentiment and activity – which hit record lows in January and February, lower than market expectations and unofficial indexes.

The impacts of this downturn are likely to be felt unevenly across sectors of Australia’s economy as the relationship between mainland China’s economic growth and its demand for imports is not 1:1. An indicative case is that of PRC visitors flows to Australia, where heterogeneity between reasons for visiting mean that while tourist visitor numbers have been almost completely curtailed, a smaller proportion of visitors coming for education are affected, with 50 percent of student visa holders from mainland China onshore by March 1.

Finally, the COVID-19 pandemic has seen the revival of commentary arguing that Australia is economically ‘too dependent’ on the PRC. However, COVID-19 is clearly now a global shock rather than a PRC-specific one, meaning that while Australia’s exports to the mainland Chinese market will decline, so too will exports to other markets. Further, it is likely that mainland China will be the first major economy to recover, despite significant headwinds.

An increasingly scrutinised aspect of Australia's relationship with the People’s Republic of China (PRC) is collaboration – particularly between universities – in scientific research, especially into what are deemed sensitive fields such as artificial intelligence (AI).

Artificial intelligence (AI) has in in recent years received widespread attention for its potential to transform vast swathes of the global economy and global society. While there might be many opportunities presented by the new frontiers of AI and the swift advances in the design and harnessing of its technologies, there is also great potential for such technologies to be abused and applied to undesirable ends.

The PRC’s position among global leaders in the development and uptake of such technologies means that research collaboration fittingly receives critical examination. How can Australia respond to the risks and benefits of collaborating with the PRC in AI research?

The Australia-China Relations Institute at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS:ACRI) recently released a research paper examining this issue. One of the paper’s co-authors, Michael Zhou, a researcher at UTS:ACRI, joins Elena Collinson, senior researcher at UTS:ACRI, to discuss PRC advancements in AI, trends in Australia’s collaboration with the PRC in artificial intelligence research and the benefits and risks attached to it.