[Buddha-l] Is Australia a Buddhist Country?

[Sally McAra]

Eric Nelson wrote:

>The article suggests that Australia has both high Buddhist immigration
>and "western converts." Does anyone know whether these trends are
>actually higher in Australia than other western counties and, if yes,
>why this might be the case? Eric
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Hi Eric
According to census stats, Buddhism is growing fast in Australia.
The Australian Bureau of Stats has some info on this:

http://www.abs.gov.au/Ausstats/abs@.nsf/0/fa58e975c470b73cca256e9e00296645?OpenDocument 

and

http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/0/9658217EBA753C2CCA256CAE00053FA3?Open

The table at the bottom of this site shows Buddhism as undergoing a 
79.1% increase between the 1996 and 2001 censuses, so that is high (The 
next highest was Islam, which had a 40.2% increase in the same time 
period). It is a bigger increase than in NZ, from memory. (I have some 
stats on that, but have not got a figure for the intercensal increase - 
are you any good at analysing stats? It's not my strong point)

I have not compared with census stats from other countries, but I do 
have some literature references on this kind of thing, mainly from the 
online Journal of Global Buddhism. Let me know if you want more info.

Cheers
Sally

-- 
Sally McAra
PhD candidate
Department of Anthropology 
The University of Auckland
Private Bag 92019
Auckland 1001
New Zealand
http://www.arts.auckland.ac.nz/ant/Student%20Details/StudentPages/SallyMcara.htm