The nature of work is changing, with developed economies facing the possibility that roughly half of the current jobs in the market will no longer exist by 2030. 

The University of Canberra’s Knowledge City Index studied 25 Australian cities to understand their resilience and capabilities, as well as to develop an understanding of the changing nature of work and knowledge capability. 

Of the 25 cities in the study, the KCI has found that only five cities are ready to capitalise on opportunities driven by information and technology.

Sydney, Melbourne, Canberra/Queanbeyan, Brisbane and Perth have been identified as the nation’s top performers.

City rankings were based on factors including whether residents had tertiary qualifications, availability of digital resources such as high-speed broadband, income levels from knowledge-creating work and the number of people using technology to work flexibly.

Lead author and Dean of the University’s Faculty of Business, Government and Law Professor Lawrence Pratchett said the top cities had a good combination of size and proportion of knowledge-intensive industry.

“Canberra more than makes up for its small population, by having a far higher proportion of knowledge industry, like the local universities, the public service and other service-focused enterprises,” Professor Pratchett said.

University of Canberra Professor of Built Environment and Design and co-author of the study, Richard Hu, said the low-ranked cities are of particular risk of missing out on the opportunities of the knowledge economy.

“Most of the tail-end cities are traditional port, industrial and mining cities, and we’ve identified significant weaknesses and limitations in their capacity to seize these kind of opportunities,” he said.

“It’s worth remembering that almost half of Australia’s population live in the top five performing cities, and we can see that they will be central to advancing the knowledge economy Australia-wide.”

The report identifies cities with untapped potential, where infrastructure and capital investment in areas like high-speed broadband could help close the gap with the top ranked cities.