Summary: The New England-North West region (also known as the Northern Inland) has experienced substantial changes. During the nineteenth century the driving forces in production and employment were primary production and mining. During the twentieth century the predominant area of employment became the services sector. This e-brief examines the region, looking at its administrative and productive structure and the influences that currently bear on it.

In this e-brief the name “New England-North West” is used primarily because that is the nomenclature adopted by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) in its new regional geography, which is relied on here for labour force data. Geographically, this region is very nearly identical to the Regional Development Australia (RDA) Northern Inland region and therefore the two names can be used more or less interchangeably.