If you're considering a career change in Launceston, the health care and social assistance sectors have seen a boom in employment opportunities in recent years, according to the City of Launceston's State of the City report.
The State of the City report has examined local, state and federal government data, as well as other sources, to understand trends in Launceston across a range of sectors and to collate information about Launceston in one convenient report.
Using data and reports from the 2020/21 financial year, or the most recent information available, the Council has examined Launceston specific data relating to population, employment, transport, digital inclusion, education, sport, recreation, culture, the arts, and development.
The report shows the municipality experienced positive population growth at 1.15%, or a net increase of 779 people, for the reporting year with the growth rate nearing the Population Taskforce Strategy's annual target of 1.2%.
Early indications suggest that Launceston's positive population growth continued throughout 2021.
According to the Regional Movers Index, Launceston was ranked fourth among regional cities nationwide, with a 34% increase in regional migration from capital cities.
A number of employment sectors saw increases to full time equivalent jobs, with the largest increases in the Health Care and Social Assistance sector (an increase of 656 full-time equivalent local workers), Professional, Scientific and Technical Services (an increase of 201 full-time equivalent local workers), the construction industry (an increase of 146 full-time equivalent local workers) and education and training (an increase of 135 full-time equivalent local workers).
The report found Launceston was the region's employment hub with 37% of people who worked in Launceston living outside the Launceston municipality.
It found 15.7% of people who worked in the municipality travelled from the West Tamar, 10.8% travelled from Meander Valley and 6.3% travelled from the Northern Midlands. The car remained the most popular form of transport, with 89% of commuters to Launceston choosing to travel to work in their own car.
Only 17.5% of the population who lived in Launceston worked outside the municipality.
Development in the municipality continued to boom, with the Council approving 771 planning applications worth $383m in the reporting period.
This included more than 100 development applications within one kilometre of the CBD, with a combined value of $53 million.
Of the 771 planning applications approved by the City of Launceston, 549 were for residential projects with a combined value of $167m.
In the environmental sector, the report found Launceston was performing better than most cities in the National Cities Performance Framework Report with 11.1 tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions per capita per year, for a total of 758,740 tonnes.
The Council's annual emissions were approximately 59,000 tonnes, 89% of which came from the City of Launceston's landfill site.
The report also identified challenges for the municipality, including unemployment rates, a lack of indoor sports facilities, poor air quality levels, and high levels of disadvantage in some suburbs.
At just 37.5%, Launceston came dead last in a ranking of 22 Australian cities for dwellings with access to open space, defined in the National Cities Performance Framework Report as the proportion of dwellings within 400m walking distance of a public open space 1.5 hectares in size or greater.
The report also found 43.1% of Launceston's population had left school at Year 10 or below, and only 39.1% of people aged over 15 had completed Year 12 — a figure 12.8% lower than the national average.
Launceston Mayor Albert van Zetten said the report was designed to provide a snapshot to the Council, investors, residents and other tiers of government about how the municipality was performing, and which challenges and opportunities it would face in the future.
"The State of the City report is part of the City of Launceston's Four Year Delivery Plan and contains a range of relevant and interesting data which allow us to track how our city is developing," Mayor van Zetten said.
"It pulls together information across a variety of sectors to give us a snapshot in time.
"The report will help the Council prioritise initiatives in the future and aid in strategic decision making for the municipality."
The City of Launceston's State of the City report can be viewed here.
