Australia and the United States are British colonies, with the exception of Alaska, both of which cover more than 7 million square kilometres. Why is the United States, with a population of more than 300 million, the only superpower in the world, while Australia, with a population of just over 24 million, is several levels below that of the United States?
Because the environment in Australia is too bad. Here are three photos:
Look at the climate map first.
Australia is vast, but most of its territory belongs to tropical desert climate and subtropical grassland climate.
Think of the Mongolian grassland north of the Great Wall of China. Mongolia grassland is temperate grassland, low temperature, evaporation is not strong, although not farming, but large-scale grazing.
Australia is a sub-tropical and savanna, water evaporation, resulting in low vegetation coverage. No grazing is allowed in most areas.
Take a look at the topographic map again.
The picture shows that only Australia's southeast and southwest corners are habitable. There is a severe shortage of water in other areas, and rivers often stop flowing. Although there is a lot of precipitation in the northern part of China, it is difficult to survive for a long time because of the large evaporation and unstable precipitation.
Australia's position in the world is also a major factor.
In addition to territorial area, climate and cultivated land area, geographical location also has a great impact on a country or region.
A country with the same natural conditions, if it is on the coast of mainland, or on the peninsula or island near mainland, can rely on the vast market of mainland to develop its economy and feed more people.
For example, although Singapore is very small, but it is located in the Strait of Malacca, geographical location is very important. Singapore's development of shipping, refining, finance and trade with the rest of the world will also drive Singapore's good growth.
Next, South Korea, close to China and Japan, used western technology to develop trade with Japan and China to prosper and feed more than 50 million people.
On the other hand, if you stay away from mainland, away from the consumer market, the economy will be very poor, unable to feed a large number of people.
Australia is a country far from mainland. Its domestic market is small and far away from its trading partners in East Asia, North America and Europe. The cost of transportation is too high for local industry to develop. We can only develop some special industries according to local conditions, such as mining, tourism, animal husbandry, etc., and make use of the advantage of English to develop education industries such as Britain, so as to attract foreigners to study abroad.
That's why Australia is as big as the United States, but only a very small population needs to feed.