1. Women’s leadership in regional Australia

2. Aims:
To make visible the varied leadership roles women in regional Australia have taken on;
To reflect on the reasons for women’s relative absence from formal leadership roles.

3. Women employed in regional Australia, by location
In agriculture
In other industries
Total
% not in agriculture
Metropolitan
13 757
99.5
Inner regional
33 943
95.2
Outer regional
39 381
90.9
Remote
8 865
53 538
62 403
85.8
Very remote
4 121
27 346
31 467
86.9
2.6

4. Women employed in regional Australia, by occupation
Occupational group
% employed women in each occupation
Managers & administrators
7.6
Professionals
18.2
Associate Professionals
11.8
Tradespersons & related workers
3.6
Advanced clerical & service workers
6.5
Intermediate clerical, sales & service workers
24.4
Intermediate production & transport workers
2.4
Elementary clerical, sales & service workers
14.1
Labourers & related workers
9.5
Inadequately described/not stated
2.0

5. Enterprising women in regional Australia (Still and Simmons, 2005)
17% regional women reported that a key motivation for their start up decision was to bring their experience and qualifications to their community.
Their business activities are diverse and often deliver the only service-type functions in small communities.

6. Women on regional boards
Rural and regional bodies
% women members
% women CEOs
Agricultural commodity councils 9
Research & development corporations 16
Rural representative bodies 13 2
Agricultural companies 7
Regional development boards 25
Area consultative committees 28 20
Catchment management authorities 26 15

7. Women’s absence from formal leadership roles in regional Australia
Despite their broad employment experiences, regional women remain ‘invisible’;
Their businesses are not valued;
They are allowed access to those bodies that are low status and with limited resources;

8. Conclusion
Leadership in regional Australia continues to reinforce the ‘naturalness’ of men in formal positions of authority and women in subordinate positions.