Opinion: By Dr Vanda Fortunato, AMES Chair

Tropical Cyclone Alfred was just another reminder that extreme weather events are becoming the norm as the impacts of climate change and warming oceans accelerate.

While the cyclone didn’t wreak the havoc predicted and the response by emergency services was thorough and better prepared than in the case of previous disasters, the aftermath has made one thing clear.

In rebuilding disaster affected areas into the future, Australia will need a skilled and available workforce.

We are already in the grip of a skills shortage, so the people in Queensland and northern NSW, whose properties have been damaged or destroyed, will join a long waiting list of businesses and householders who need builders, electricians, plumbers and other skilled workers.

There are already not enough workers to support Australia’s normal building and maintenance needs, without factoring in disaster mitigation and recovery.

The Commonwealth Government’s Jobs and Skills Australia agency has estimated that 67 occupations covered by the ‘Technicians and Trades Workers’ category are in chronic and long-term shortage, representing about a third of all skills shortages across the country.

These shortages are pushing up construction costs and are worse in rural and regional areas, many of which are vulnerable to natural disasters.

Making matters worse is global competition for skilled migrants, competition between states within Australia for workers with critical skills and the leakage of skilled workers from regional areas to the cities.

One solution to this might be to harness the skills that refugees migrants bring with them but often are not able to utilise because of structural barriers to achieving jobs commensurate with their qualifications and experience.

Also, among the world’s 120 million displaced people, there are many who possess skills that, with minimal support, could prove a boon to Australia’s productivity.

My organisation, migrant and refugee settlement agency AMES Australia, recently commissioned an economist to run the numbers on what a scheme to better harness the talents of migrant and refugees would look like.

The paper, produced by Dr Ian Pringle, found utilising the skills and experience migrants and refugees bring with them could benefit Australia’s economy by as much as $10 billion over five years.

It found supporting new arrivals to re-establish their professional careers in Australia could generate more than $2.5 billion in extra tax receipts as well as an extra $8 billion in earnings circulating in the economy over five years.

What’s more is that the extra access to skills could also produce a ten per cent spike in productivity while adding more than $10 billion to Australia’s GDP over five years.

The paper, titled ‘Untapped: How Australia can reap economic benefits from better utilising the skills of migrants and refugees’, found between a third and half of skilled migrant are not using all of the professional skills, experience and qualifications after arrival in Australia.

It said barriers to migrants reaching their full potential included a lack of local experience and networks, unfamiliarity with Australian workplace culture and the job market as well as language or pronunciation.

But we know that intensive support delivered early in migrants’ settlement journeys can achieve positive results in supporting new arrivals achieve their career aspirations.

One such program is our own Skilled Professional Migrant Program (SPMP) which has a 77 per cent success rate in helping participants find work within six months – most in professional work aligned with their qualifications.

The SPMP costs as little as $1000 per student and the paper found an investment of around $10 million a year would enable it to be delivered across the country.

The paper showed it was clear improved employment outcomes among migrants and refugees would deliver a dividend to the Australian economy and go some way towards addressing the skills shortages.

We at AMES have seen first-hand the success the SPMP program has had in equipping migrants and refugees gain jobs appropriate to their skills.

One success was the story of electrical engineer is Nirad Chatterjee, who spent a decade working on some of the biggest infrastructure projects in the Middle East.

But on migrating to Australia, he struggled to resume his professional career. Since completing the SPMP, Nirad has been able to resume his professional career in Australia working on infrastructure projects in Melbourne.

Another solution is to harness the untapped potential of some of the more than 120 million people who are displaced around the world.

Currently the federal government is trialing a program called the Skilled Refugee Labour Agreement Pilot

Thes scheme waives the usual visa requirements for skilled migration and is seeing around 40 per cent of refugee participants employed by businesses and organisations in regional areas.

Enduring problems need innovative solutions.

Harnessing the skills refugees possess at a time when many nations are closing their borders to refugees could see Australia enhance its response to the worsening global displacement crisis while also providing opportunities for employers to source skilled workers.