Population

Today, Indigenous people make up 2.4% of the total Australian population (about 460,000 out of 19 million people). Indigenous Australians continue to live throughout Australia including cities, towns, the coast, rural areas and the outback. There is no single Indigenous culture but a mixture of contemporary and traditional thoughts, ways and practices. Australia’s population has increased by about 60 times since European settlement, and has quadrupled since the end of World War I. Australia’s lifestyle reflects its mainly Western origins, but Australia is also a multicultural society which has been enriched by nearly five million settlers from almost 200 nations. Four out of 10 Australians were born overseas or are the first-generation children of people born overseas, and half of these are from non-English speaking backgrounds. In 2001, the five largest groups of 25% of Australians born overseas were from the United Kingdom, New Zealand, Italy, Vietnam and China.