Measures of Australiaʼs Progress 2010

From Wikiprogress.org

Overview

Measures of Austalia's Progress 2010 (MAP2010) is the latest version of the Measures of Australia's Progress (MAP) product of the Australian Bureau of Statistics. MAP2010 is an electronic publication that looks at change over the last decade in key areas that provide an evidence base for assessing progress in Australia. It uses traffic lights to summarise progress and regress across the headline dimensions.

MAP2010 aims to address the question: is life in Australia getting better? It provides a digestible selection of statistical evidence in answer to this question. People can use this evidence to form their own view of how Australia is progressing.

MAP2010 Indicators

MAP2010 has approximately 80 headline and supplementary indicators. They are grouped under three broad headings: the society, the economy and the environment. Within these broad domains several dimensions are addressed, such as health and work within the social domain, national income within the economic domain, and biodiversity within the environmental domain. Within each dimension there are a range of statistical measures presented, known as progress indicators. These indicators tell a story about the extent of progress within that dimension.

The indicators directly address the notion of progress, and some contextual measures are also included which provide useful context to support the progress information. In addition, for some dimensions, information that relates to specific groups of interest, such as older people, men and women, or Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples are included.

 Society

• Health
• Education and training
• Work
• Family, community and social cohesion
• Crime
• Democracy, governance and citizenship

Economy

• National income
• National wealth
• Household economic wellbeing
• Housing
• Productivity

Environment

• Biodiversity
• Land
• Inland waters
• Oceans and estuaries
• Atmosphere
• Waste

Traffic lights

MAP2010 included a dashboard of 15 headline indicators on the MAP2010 homepage to improve the accessibility and visibility of the measures and help people, at a glance, assess whether some key aspects of life in Australia are getting better. For these headline indicators on the MAP2010 homepage, progress or regress (or no change) is determined by comparing two data points: 10 years ago with the most recent available data. A "traffic light" (red, green or amber) is then used to demonstrate this movement for each indicator.

More detail about changes that occured during the last decade, or detail about changes that go back further in time are available within the relevant pages of the product.

The traffic light system differs from how the headline indicators are presented on the more detailed pages because it looks at change between only two points in time, rather than the history of movements that occurred during the ten year period.

These headline indicators have been highlighted because they summarise very effectively change in the relevant dimension. They show change that is very clearly either positive or negative. Also, these statistics were chosen on the basis that most Australians would agree that the change they show can be unambiguously associated with progress or regress.

Difference with previous MAP products

MAP2010 has a number of changes from previous MAP products that have been incorporated into this edition:

• The MAP publication is now entirely electronic, supported by a hard copy brochure. This has allowed the ABS to use data visualisation tools to enhance the graphs.
• A dashboard display of social, economic and environmental headline indicators on the MAP home page using "traffic lights" to show progress or regress.
• The environment domain has been restructured towards a presentation that is more consistent with other major environmental reports, notably State of the Environment report which is produced five yearly in Australia under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999.
• A headline indicator, low income rental affordability, has been included for the first time in Housing dimension.

Future directions for MAP

MAP2010 included a special article outlining future directions for measuring Australia's progress. The article kickstarted a review of MAP and the ABS will conduct a large scale consultation with the experts, users and the general community over 2011 to help shape how it measure progress in Australia.

View MAP 2010

To view the full MAP2010 product please click on the link to MAP2010.

See also official press release MAP2010 Press Release

Interview with Sue Taylor on MAP 2010

About MAP

First published in 2002, Measures of Australia's Progress (MAP) provides information about how Australian society has progressed. Each year, the Australian Bureau of Statistics produces a report around 14 headline dimensions under 4 key headings: Individuals, The Economy and Economic Resources, The Environment, Living Together. See full details of MAP in the wikiprogres Measures of Australia's Progress article

Previous MAP reports

• Measures of Australia's Progress: Summary Indicators 2009 (Latest)
• Measures of Australia's Progress: Summary Indicators 2008 (Edition 2)
• Measures of Australia's Progress: Summary Indicators 2008 (Edition 1)
• Measures of Australia's Progress: Summary Indicators 2007 (Edition 2)
• Measures of Australia's Progress: Summary Indicators 2007 (Edition 1)
• Measures of Australia's Progress: Summary Indicators 2006
• Measures of Australia's Progress: Summary Indicators 2005

See also

• MAP 2.0
• Measures of Australia's Progress

• NatStats2010

• Australia
• Australian National Development Index (ANDI)

External links

• Measures of Australia's Progress official site

• Australian Bureau of Statistics

• NatStats2010 official site

Further reading

• Average annual rate of change of selected MAP indicators over the past 10 years(a) (ABS)
• Measures of Australia's Progress: Summary Indicators
  
• Relationships between domains of progress (ABS 2008)
• Life satisfaction and measures of progress (ABS 2006)
• Some international comparisons of progress (ABS 2006)
• Multiple disadvantage (ABS 2004)
• Progress indicators in other countries (ABS 2004)
• Population, participation and productivity (ABS 2004)