It's time to go for growth and ensure the Australian economy continues its strong COVID-19 economic recovery.
Data released by the ABS has shown high commodity prices in 2021 led to surge in mineral exploration activity in Australia.
This strong performance has mainly been driven by the gold sector with the latest gold rush delivering a record high $1.6 billion of gold exploration investment across the country.
Total drilling increased 24 per cent to an all-time high of 13.2 million metres drilled while exploration expenditure totalled $3.6 billion, up 28 per cent from the previous year.
The results are encouraging, but the lead time from discovering a mineral deposit to opening a new mine often exceeds 15 years.
More needs to be done to ensure exploration is converted into the development of new mines.
Australia has lagged behind in discovering new major deposits of the copper, nickel and cobalt the world needs as it transitions to a net-zero emissions future.
We risk missing out on the enormous opportunities the growth in demand for these commodities presents our economy.
Australia still remains under-explored, particularly at greater depths.
To improve the chances of making a major discovery, more government funding should be provided to pre-competitive survey programs.
These include Geoscience Australia's highly successful Exploring for the Future which create rich geological datasets for all exploration and mining companies to interrogate for signs of new mineral deposits.
To speed up the development of these prospects effective, comprehensive and complementary productivity enhancing policies are needed to ensure that Australia does not lose mining and minerals processing opportunities to economies that offer lower construction and energy costs, as well as lower taxes.
