Future Geelong: Bernard Salt says now is the time for Geelong’s outrageous aspiration to come to the fore

Bernard Salt says 21st century Geelong offers everyday Australians the opportunity to learn, to work, to buy a home, to build a business, to have a medical procedure, to fly-off on a holiday, all from a safe, supportive, pleasant – no, strike pleasant, insert ripper – spot.

Demographer Bernard Salt says Geelong pic: Lyndon Mechielsen/Courier Mail

Geelong has gone through a metamorphosis over the last decade.

Old industries that delivered wealth and prosperity in the 20th century receded – Ford, International Harvester, Kinnears – while other industries, notably administrative knowledge work, emerged.

This included public sector entities that were transferred to or established within Geelong – entities like the Transport Accident Commission, WorkSafe, and the National Disability Insurance Agency.

There’s even a division of the Australian Bureau of Statistics based in Geelong, which is the group’s only office located in a non-capital city.

And then there is public sector investment in new, but nevertheless much-needed, big-picture pieces of infrastructure like the Ring Road and the extension of a dual carriageway through to Colac.

All this and more has been delivered to the Geelong region across the first two decades of the 21st century.

Oh, and I think I should have acknowledged a few AFL premierships too.

Success breeds success or so it would appear.

Aspirational, and by Melbourne standards, slightly more affordable housing is blossoming at places like Fyansford and Armstrong Creek, as well as along the coast in towns like Torquay and Ocean Grove.

The point is that 21st century Geelong offers everyday Australians the opportunity to learn, to work, to buy a home, to build a business, to have a medical procedure, to fly-off on a holiday, all from a safe, supportive, pleasant – no, strike pleasant, insert ripper – spot.

And there’s more to come.

The former Ford site in North Geelong is being transformed into a business park.

There is every reason to expect Australia will invest further in defence manufacturing capabilities.

Geelong’s skilled automotive workforce make it a natural hub for this industry.

Geelong has a long connection with agribusiness, notably via Western District wool and Wimmera wheat.

With the world population projected to rise from 8bn to 10bn over the next 50 years, there is an opportunity – perhaps even a responsibility – for Australia to produce and export more food and agricultural product.

Geelong can be an even greater hub for agribusiness.

The port of Geelong is a key asset in this prosperity-enabling industry.

Whatever tonnage the port is processing today must, by my demographic logic, be far greater in a bigger, hungrier world.

Let’s build on these assets by developing skills and centres-for-excellence in the local area. How about a Centre of Agribusiness Excellence attached to, say, Deakin?

And why stop at agribusiness excellence?

What about defence, disability care, insurance?

How about a locally-based technical training centre specialising in diesel mechanics and machinery that could contribute to both defence and agribusiness?

And while I’m conjuring up opportunities for Geelong, why not invest in and/or build upon this city’s greatest asset: the capacity to create new businesses.

With the permission of his family, I’d respectfully call it the Frank Costa Centre for Entrepreneurship.

Businessman Frank Costa was a much-loved figure in Geelong. Picture: Glenn Ferguson.

Melbourne’s BHP is the world’s biggest mining company.

And why not? Australia is a vast continent with vast resources.

So, why have we never developed an agribusiness counterpart to BHP?

Why is it that New Zealand’s Fonterra and Canada’s Saputo snap up Australian agribusiness assets?

At some point over the last 100 years, early agribusiness businesses in Australia failed to make the leap into global thinking.

So surely at some point across the 21st century the renewable energy industry, where Australia has a natural advantage in solar, must scale-up and corporatise.

Why wouldn’t at least one of the world’s biggest renewables energy corporations be located in Australia, indeed in Geelong, by the mid-2030s?

It’s not so much a question of whether such an outcome is likely.

It’s more a question as to whether Geelong has the self-confidence, the boldness, and the outrageous aspiration that this kind of thinking embodies.

This is exactly the kind of thinking that should be aired, debated and hopefully finessed in an event like Future Geelong.

Bernard Salt AM resided in Geelong from 1981-1995.

He will speak at the Future Geelong event at GMHBA Stadium on March 1.

Originally published as Future Geelong: Bernard Salt says now is the time for Geelong’s outrageous aspiration to come to the fore