Country experience: Australia and the survey of students
7.83. Education related travel services, one of the largest contributors to service exports in Australia, are derived using a modelled approach. The approach combines data on the number of foreign students studying in Australia with estimates of expenditure by foreign students on course fees and on other goods and services.
7.84. Estimates for the number of foreign students studying in Australia are based on quarterly stock data for a range of study-related visa subclasses provided by the Department of Immigration and Border Protection of Australia. Estimates of student numbers for the inter-quartile months are compiled using information from overseas arrivals and departures data of the Australia Bureau of Statistics (ABS), with a small adjustment made to account for permanent migration.
7.85. Monthly estimates of course fees per student registration are derived from international student fees data supplied by Australian Education International. That data set is supplied by the educational sector on a per-semester basis. The data is then split into months, according to the number of students studying in Australia for each month in that semester (as estimated above).
7.86. Monthly estimates of per-capita expenditure on other goods and services by foreign students are derived from data collected in the survey of international students studying in Australia, conducted by Universities Australia. The survey provides estimated average weekly expenditure on goods and services for selected educational sectors, which is then converted into a monthly estimate. As the survey is conducted irregularly, most recently in respect of the 2010 calendar year, estimates are interpolated between survey years and extrapolated to the most recent period, with reference to the ABS all groups consumer price index.
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