What are the top growth sectors in Australia for the next two decades?
The latest report in the series Building the Lucky Country from Deloittes Access Economics highlights upcoming sectors that have potential to grow significantly in Australia and give the country an edge in the global arena. It puts its Fantastic Five in the spotlight: gas, agribusiness, tourism, international education and wealth management.
Positioning for prosperity? Catching the next wave suggests that Australia will be the fastest-growing developed Western nation in the next few years.
The report points out though that this is not the same as saying Australian growth rates will accelerate. “Deloitte (along with the Federal Treasury), believes that the longer term growth of the economy will be more modest that the rates recorded over the past two, recession –free decades.”
What will have an effect on growth is the retirement of the baby boomers.
But for anyone looking for what will boom across the country in the future, the so-called Local Heroes include the services around, and demands of, an ageing population.
Think the obvious: residential aged care, preventative health and wellness, retirement living and leisure, community and personal care. Then think of the other services which sit in the ‘megatrend’ of an ageing demographic: financing the future, the digital delivery of health, reskilling an ageing workforce, and parcel delivery.
BUSINESS OPPORTUNITIES
Busy Australians are looking for time-saving services. So community and personal care – the domestic services, dog walkers, personal shopping services – are set to grow by 4.79 percent, says Deloittes. [Check out how the cleaning sector is shaping up].
Enabling these older Australians to stay in work and deal with the challenges of rapid technological change will require reskilling and education – another opportunity.
Australians will be at risk of outliving their savings, while at the same time banks, super funds and new financial services providers will look to maximise the assets of the wealthier retirees. There is a host of opportunities around products that will service both elements of the ageing population.
Retirement living and leisure is another attractive proposition. According to the report, the baby boomers have invested in property and shares, and are now financially set-up. “Those who retire in the next two decades will, on average, have funds available on a scale never before seen in Australia. At the same time, the coming wave of retirements among baby boomers will be large, and will come with more ambitious expectations of their retirement years than previous generations,” the report suggests.
Seventy-five will be the new 55, the report suggests, and retirement facilities will become increasingly luxurious.
While there has been a boom in at-home care, residential aged care will prove to be a boom business, but it’s the slow burner, with the peak years of the baby boomers entering nursing homes more than a decade away.
But the preventative health and wellness sector is set to see the greatest growth over the next 20 years, according to the report. The potential reaches across the industry, from those organisations helping to address risk factors such as smoking and weight issues, anything helping people lead more active lives [vitamins, remedial massage, Pilates for instance] through to diagnostic centres and allied health professionals [optometry, dentistry, pharmacy, physiotherapy].
Jason Smith, founder of healthcare franchise Back In Motion, has his business on a rapid expansion program, aiming to reach a $50 million turnover, with 100 practices across seven states in three years.
“We haven’t had our best years yet. We haven’t hit the sweet spot,” says Smith. “We’re getting older and living longer but not necessarily better. Integrative physiotherapy is about ageing with dignity,” he says in an interview withFranchising magazine.
And parcel delivery has potential too: convenience and cost the key consumer drivers for this business arena. The report indicates Australia Post has delivered 9.3 percent more parcels domestically in the 2012-13 financial year, while growth has been seen at Fastway Couriers too; the company’s comparative growth figure for 2012-2013 is 13 percent.
What else? Honourable mentions go to: waste management, building homes and infrastructure suited to an ageing population.
Images: Thinkstock/Back in Motion