Key facts about Australia
5 to 10 facts that help explain what makes the country distinctive.
A purpose-built capital that is not the largest city
Canberra was specially designed and built in the early 20th century to settle the rivalry between Sydney and Melbourne, both then vying to be capital; it has only about 485,000 inhabitants today, far behind Sydney and Melbourne (more than 5 million each).
The world's largest uranium reserves, zero nuclear electricity
Australia holds about a third of the world's identified uranium reserves and is one of its largest exporters, but building nuclear power plants has been banned there since 1999: the country generates no nuclear electricity, a unique case among the major uranium-exporting economies.
The driest inhabited continent after Antarctica
With average rainfall of only 419 mm a year, Australia is the most arid inhabited continent after Antarctica, which explains the extreme concentration of its population on a narrow coastal strip.
No land borders
The only nation to occupy an entire continent, Australia is the only large country in the world that shares no land border with another state.
A referendum on Indigenous recognition rejected in 2023
On October 14, 2023, Australians rejected by 60.1% the constitutional creation of an Indigenous advisory body (the "Voice to Parliament"), with the proposal failing to win a majority in any of the six states.
One in four residents born abroad
Australia has one of the highest shares of foreign-born population among the major developed economies, the result of one of the most generous net immigration policies in the world.