Australia Has A New AUD 800 Million Business Plan, Including Blockchain

Following the creation of blockchain work groups for various industry sectors across Australia a few weeks ago, Prime Minister Scott Morrison has unveiled an AUD 800 million Digital Business Plan for the government to follow.

The plan includes several non-blockchain initiatives – however, many of these are for Distributed Ledger Technology systems, a technology closely associated to blockchain.

These plans include an AUD 256 million investment for a system that will provide Digital Identification, and  an AUD 420 million Business Register that will greatly simplify the current methods used.

Compliance Costs Will Be Reduced Through Blockchain

Nearly 9.7 million AUD will be set aside for two new blockchain projects targeting business compliance costs – and the unnecessary amount of funding spent to check it.

According to PM Scott Morrisson, the business plan should help small businesses by cutting costs – and by removing unnecessary regulatory barriers.

“The Plan supports Australia’s economic recovery by removing out-dated regulatory barriers, boosting the capability of small businesses and backs the uptake of technology across the economy.”

A good deal of  other fintech initiatives were outlined in the new business plan, some of which could also have ties to blockchain – although this has not yet been confirmed.

Just a few weeks ago, the Select Committee on Financial Technology (FinTech) and Regulatory Technology (RegTech) published an interim report that was positive about blockchain. A fintech lawyer told the committee that the majority if FinTech and RegTech solutions are likely to use Distributed Ledger Technology within the next ten years.

At the time, Power Ledger’s co-founder and Executive Chairman Dr. Jemma Green also highlighted that although over $26 billion had been raised through ICOs, Australia gained less than 1 percent of the profit.

By properly regulating blockchain technology and ICOs even further, Dr. Green believes that tens of thousands of new jobs will be created, which will in turn bring in even more revenue to be invested in further development.

Indeed, in the report it is speculated that the potential gain due to using blockchain technology is “estimated at $175 billion annually within five years and $3 trillion by 2030”.

With Hedera technology also being recently unveiled as a blockchain-based partner for Australian industries, the adoption of blockchain in every corner of the Australian market is advancing at a steady pace.