Australia today marks National Day

Chisinau, 26 January /MOLDPRES/ - Australia marks its National Day today. This state includes the territory of the continent of Australia, Tasmania Island and other small islands around it. Australia is made up of six states and two territories.

Australia or officially Commonwealth of Australia is the single country that occupies an entire continent, with an area of 7.7 million square km and a population of 23.3 million inhabitants. Australia ranks sixth in the world in terms of area. 

The Australian economy is among the first 15 ones in the world, whereas its GDP is among the first 20. Australia has a prosperous economy, with a GDP a little bit bigger than the one of Germany, France and the United Kingdom (if we refer to the purchasing power parity). The absence of a producing export-oriented industry is considered a weak point of the Australian economy. Yet, once the tourism developed and income increased due to exports, the criticism has become irrelevant.

Australia exports industrial equipment, chemical products, textiles, food products and imports industrial raw material, cars, industrial machines and devices, consumer products. 

The Moldovan-Australian diplomatic ties were set on 1 April 1992.

Starting from 1 July 2012, the Moldovans benefit from a facilitated visa regime to travel to Australia. Thus, the Moldovan citizens no longer need to go to the Moscow-based Australian Embassy. The citizens interested to get an entry visa for Australia may apply on-line, by sending an application form and copies of necessary documents to the Australian Embassy from Moscow.

Data  by the National Statistics Bureau shows that goods in amount of 67,100 dollars were exported to Australia in January-April 2014, a little bit more compared to the same period of 2013 (55,200 dollars). The goods exported to Moldova were of 237,900 dollars in January-April 2014, that is about 1.6-fold more against the same period of 2013 – 145,100 dollars.