Highlights
- Australia shed nearly 600,000 temporary visa holders in 2020
- Many visa holders, including international students, departed in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic
- Of 600,000 migrants who left, nearly 41,000 were from India
In the most significant population dip in Australian history, hundreds of temporary visa holders, including tourists, holidaymakers, international students, and work visa holders departed Australia last year in a mass exodus that threatens to aggravate the country’s economic woes.
The latest data from the Department of Home Affairs indicates the main drivers of the decline were visitors and working holidaymakers, . There were also 31,000 less student visa holders in December last year compared to the same period in 2019.
The figures also show that the sharpest decline was witnessed in the three months after the pandemic struck in March, a period in which nearly 143,000 visa holders exited the country.
‘Grave’ impact on the economy and population:
Former senior Immigration Department official Abul Rizvi says the impact has been worsened by the fact that temporary visa holders are leaving the country in droves but are not arriving into the country in the wake of the hard border ban that currently allows only Australian citizens and permanent residents to trickle back into the country.
He adds that two industries – mainly education and tourism have been worst-hit by this mass exodus.
Sharpest decline was witnessed in the three months after the pandemic struck in March, a period in which nearly 143,000 temporary visa holders left Australia. Source: AAP
“We are seeing the impact of this on universities which have shed a reported 17,000 jobs, international tourism and difficulties farmers are facing in getting farm labour,” he says.
“In the long term, the impact will be in terms of Australia's population ageing faster than anticipated prior to the pandemic. This would bring forward the day deaths will begin to exceed births in Australia, although Australia may still be the last developed nation that moves into this phase.”
Mr Rizvi predicts temporary migrants would continue to return home because of the “weak labour market.”
“If they cannot get a job or keep their current job, it is very hard for them to survive in Australia as they have no access to any government support.”
‘Current border closure will cost Australia some progress in the long term’
Last year in October, the federal budget revealed that Australia’s net migration intake would fall into negative levels for the first time since World War II and not recover to pre-pandemic levels for more than four years.
According to a 2019 , in the short term, temporary migration emerged as the biggest contributor to net overseas migration and population, accounting for 71 per cent of the growth in net migration in 2016-17.
The report also highlights the role of temporary visa holders, particularly skilled migrants in plugging critical skill gaps and their overall contribution to the economy by paying taxes and spending in the communities they live in.
Gabriela D’Souza, a senior economist with CEDA, says Australia has a long history of temporary skilled migration and “no matter how well equipped our education systems are, there are some skills and projects that require an immediate influx of skills to be able to continue and progress."
“The current border closures put a speed bump on those efforts and will cost us some progress in the longer term,” she says.
Anxious to return:
The Department of Home Affairs data reveals that of the 600,000 temporary migrants who went home last year, nearly 41,000 were of Indian origin, many of whom left before the pandemic hit and upended lives in Australia.
One of them is Apoorva Kapoor who had a high paying job with a Melbourne-based IT firm and had just started to repay her education loan before travelling to India in March last year.
Apoorva Kapoor Source: Supplied
The young consultant who had applied for a permanent residency said she feels “anxious and extremely helpless” as she can no longer work remotely despite having a great job and skillset, as her post-graduate visa expired a long time ago.
“My whole life has come to a standstill. It was so important to me that my 485 remained valid to go back to Australia and keep working. This would have enabled me to maintain a valid visa still even if the 485 expired,” she said.
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