M1 - Learner Manual

In Australia, 812,000 people identified as Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander in the 2021 Census of Population and Housing. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people represented 3.2% of the population. This was up from 2.8% in 2016, and 2.5% in 2011.

Of the 812,000 people who identified as being of Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander origin:

o        91.4% identified as Aboriginal

o        04.2% identified as Torres Strait Islander

o        04.4% identified as both Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander.

It is interesting to note that more people identified as having Aboriginal, as well as Torres Strait Islander, heritage than those who identified as being Torres Strait Islander.

In 2021, the largest proportion of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander population lived in New South Wales (34.2%) and Queensland (29.2%), while only 7.5% of Australia’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander population lived in the Northern Territory. Just over one quarter (26.3%) of the Northern Territory’s population were Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander and was much higher than the other states and territories.

The increase in the population of First Nations Peoples according to each successive census may be attributable to factors such as:

·             the increase in the number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander births

·             an increase in the number of people who have discovered their cultural heritage is Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander

·             an increase in the number of people who, whilst knowing of their Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander heritage, are now identifying as such

·             people falsely identifying as Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander