Imagining 2030: Preparing for a National Arts, Culture and Creativity Plan 

Key Findings 

To answer the question, ‘what elements might be included in a NACC Plan?’, we looked at several of the Australian government’s existing 2030 plans:

• Sport 2030: National Sport Plan
• Delivering Ag2030: National Agriculture Plan (Ag2030)
• More, Together: Defence Science and Technology Strategy 2030
• Australia 2030: Prosperity through Innovation (Innovation 2030)
• Reimagining the Visitor Economy (builds on previous work towards a Tourism 2030 plan)

These existing federal 2030 plans have a range of elements in common:

• A bold vision designed to engage the imagination of a wide range of a plan’s stakeholders
• An overview of the current context, showing why a plan is necessary
• A demonstration of what the future will look like with and without the successful implementation of a plan
• A framework showing how stakeholders of a plan will work together
• A series of themes or focal areas that should be addressed in order to achieve the plan’s goals, and
• A framework for how success will be measured.

There were also commonalities in the way they were developed. These phases included:

• Background research
• Consulting with stakeholders
• An iterative writing-consulting-rewriting process
• Implementation of the plan, and
• Monitoring and evaluation

Importantly, the contexts for these existing plans also have a range of factors in common with the arts, cultural and creative industries. These plans have been produced for areas of public policy in which there is:

• A complex stakeholder environment, comprising small and large enterprise across several different industry sectors, as well as diverse consumer interest.
• A complex intersection of national interest and private benefits.
• Existing infrastructure, value models and supply chains which require ongoing, coordinated, public and private investments to drive the gains in productivity, participation, access and innovation that will help Australia keep pace with our global peers.
• A need for transformation and renewal to ensure industry models and products are relevant and fit-for-purpose in the 21st century.

Next steps for a NACC Plan 

The current Parliamentary Inquiry into Creative and Cultural Industries and Institutions has provided up-to-date industry intelligence to inform the next steps.

Following its report, ANA recommends the federal government establish an independent process to draft a NACC Plan, drawing on both evidence presented to the Inquiry and the formidable body of current data and research that is publicly available.