Western Australia Western Australia (WA) is the westernmost state of Australia. It is bounded by the Indian Ocean to the north and west, the Southern Ocean to the south, the Northern Territory to the north-east, and South Australia to the south-east. Western Aust ...

(WA) is divided into regions according to a number of systems. The most common system is the division of the state by the

Government of Western Australia The Government of Western Australia is the States and territories of Australia, Australian state democratic administrative authority of Western Australia. It is also commonly referred to as the WA Government or the Western Australian Governmen ...

in 1993 into regions for economic development purposes, which comprises nine defined regional regions that exclude the

Perth metropolitan region The Perth metropolitan region or the Perth metropolitan area is the administrative area and geographical extent of the Western Australian capital city of Perth and its conurbation. It generally includes the coastal strip from Two Rocks in the ...

. However, there are a number of other systems, including those made for purposes of land management (such as agriculture and conservation), information gathering (such as statistical and meteorological), and election for political office. The various different systems were defined for different purposes and at different times, and give specific boundaries, but although many of the different systems' regions have similar names, they have different boundaries; the names and boundaries of regions can and do vary between systems.

The ''Regional Development Commissions Act'' regions

The Western Australian system of regional regions defined by the

for purposes of economic development administration, which excludes the

, is a series of nine regional regions. These nine regions were established by the '' Regional Development Commissions Act 1993'', which defined their extents and established Regional Development Commissions to promote their economic development. In defining the regions, an attempt was made to capture distinct socio-economic communities. For example, the Goldfields–Esperance region of Western Australia has an economy based heavily on mining, whereas the Wheatbelt region is economically dependent on agriculture.

Inter-regional travel restrictions during COVID-19 pandemic

During the Western Australian government response to the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

, travel between regionsother than between Perth and Peelwas restricted, with police

checkpoints Checkpoint may refer to: Places * Border checkpoint, a place on the land border between two states where travellers and/or goods are inspected * Security checkpoint, erected and enforced within contiguous areas under military or paramilitary cont ...

set up at the borders. Only essential travel was allowed. At some checkpoints, police were assisted by

army An army, ground force or land force is an armed force that fights primarily on land. In the broadest sense, it is the land-based military branch, service branch or armed service of a nation or country. It may also include aviation assets by ...

and State Emergency Service personnel; the army did not have any authority to prosecute or arrest. Remote communities and some "biosecurity areas" had further travel restrictions due to the lack of medical facilities and number of high risk community members. Some inter-regional restrictions were lifted on 18 May, and on 5 June all regional restrictions were removed except for remote Aboriginal communities. On 31 January 2021, after a quarantine hotel security guard in Perth tested positive, a five-day lockdown, from 6pm on 31January until 6pm on 5February was declared. Schools scheduled to resume on 1 February were to remain closed for another week. The areas affected were: "the whole Perth metropolitan area, the Peel region and the South West region .."

Bureau of Meteorology regions

The same region names as those used by the Regional Development Commissions Act (RDCA) are incorporated into the system used by

Bureau of Meteorology The Bureau of Meteorology (BOM or BoM) is an executive agency of the Government of Australia, Australian Government that is responsible for providing Weather forecasting, weather forecasts and Meteorology, meteorological services to Australia a ...

(BOM), which uses 14 regions, so the boundaries of the two systems do not coincide. In some of the regions, the BOM designates the forecast area regions with a finer level of detail using points of the compass. Regions numbered 8 to 14 are usually known as forecast areas in the ''South West Land Division''; coastal zones for sea forecasts are dealt with in the coastal regions of Western Australia.

South West Western Australia Fire Weather Forecast Areas

The South West Land Division has 23 fire districts.

Political regions

Under Australia's three-tiered system of government, Western Australia has four political regional schemes:

State government departmental regions

Many government departments maintain systems of regional and district breakdowns of the state for their own internal purposes.

Department of Education

The

Department of Education An education ministry is a national or subnational government agency politically responsible for education. Various other names are commonly used to identify such agencies, such as Ministry of Education, Department of Education, and Ministry of Pub ...

defines the following: *Goldfields *Kimberley *Midwest *North Metro *Pilbara *South Metro *Southwest *Wheatbelt

Department of Agriculture and Food

The Department of Agriculture and Food defines the following: * Northern Agricultural Region * Rangelands Region * Southern Agricultural Region * Central Agricultural Region * South West Agricultural

Main Roads Western Australia

Main Roads Western Australia defines the following: * Kimberley * Pilbara * Mid West–Gascoyne * Goldfields–Esperance * Wheatbelt * Metropolitan * Great Southern * South West

Department of Water

The Department of Water defines the following: * North West * Mid West Gascoyne * Swan Avon * Kwinana Peel * South West * South Coast

Department of Fisheries

The Department of Fisheries tends to separate the state into four main regions for the purpose of regulating recreational fishing: * North Coast – Pilbara–Kimberley * Gascoyne Coast * West Coast * South Coast.

Department of Mines and Petroleum

The Department of Mines and Petroleum produces statistical data based on the Regional Development Commissions Act regionalisation schema. Since the creation of the Department of Industry and Resources some rationalisation of mines administration has occurred, however the mineral fields and boundaries remain the same as when established.

Department of Planning, Lands and Heritage

For the Department of Planning, Lands and Heritage /

Western Australian Planning Commission The Western Australian Planning Commission (WAPC) is an independent statutory authority of the Government of Western Australia that exists to coordinate strategic and statutory planning for future urban, rural, and regional land use. The WAPC f ...

there are three regions with regional planning schemes, covering only a small part of the state: * Metropolitan Region Scheme (Perth) * Peel Region Scheme * Greater Bunbury Region Scheme

Department of Fire and Emergency Services

The Department of Fire and Emergency Services defines the following: * Kimberley * Pilbara * Mid West–Gascoyne * Goldfields * Great Southern * Kwinana–Peel * South West * Lower South West * Metropolitan

Department of Health

The

Department of Health A health department or health ministry is a part of government which focuses on issues related to the general health of the citizenry. Subnational entities, such as states, counties and cities, often also operate a health department of their o ...

defines the following: * Kimberley * Pilbara * Midwest * Goldfields * Wheatbelt * South West * Great Southern * North Metropolitan * South Metropolitan * East Metropolitan

Natural and land management

''See also :Biogeography of Western Australia'' There are a number of regionalisations that attempt to provide a regionalisation based on natural features. The best known of these are the

Interim Biogeographic Regionalisation for Australia The Interim Biogeographic Regionalisation for Australia (IBRA) is a biogeography, biogeographic regionalisation of Australia developed by the Australian government's Department of Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities ( ...

(IBRA) regions, and the

World Wildlife Fund The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) is a Swiss-based international non-governmental organization founded in 1961 that works in the field of wilderness preservation and the reduction of human impact on the environment. It was formerly named the ...

Ecoregions in Australia Ecoregions in Australia are geographically distinct plant and animal communities, defined by the World Wide Fund for Nature based on geology, soils, climate, and predominant vegetation. The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) identified 825 terres ...

, and the "natural regions" of

John Stanley Beard John Stanley Beard (15 February 1916 – 17 February 2011) was a British-born forester and ecologist who resided in Australia. Beard studied at the University of Oxford where he completed his doctoral thesis on tropical forestry. While worki ...

, all of which are based on

biogeography Biogeography is the study of the species distribution, distribution of species and ecosystems in geography, geographic space and through evolutionary history of life, geological time. Organisms and biological community (ecology), communities o ...

. Other natural regionalisations included the drainage basins and catchments of river systems, and highly specialised regionalisations dealing with such matters as geology and soil systems. Administrative regionalisations include Landcare Districts and the Department of Agriculture's "Land-use Zones". However the Department of Agriculture publications – ''Technical Bulletins'' – usually titled ''An inventory and condition report/survey...'' of a particular region are very specifically focused upon land systems that are based on natural features.

Land tenure

Western Australia is divided into approximately 90 land districts for

cadastral A cadastre or cadaster ( ) is a comprehensive recording of the real estate or real property's metes and bounds, metes-and-bounds of a country.Jo Henssen, ''Basic Principles of the Main Cadastral Systems in the World,'/ref> Often it is represente ...

purposes. There are five land divisions in Western Australia, as specified in Schedule 1 of the Land Administration Act 1997. * Eastern Land Division * Eucla Land Division * Kimberley Land Division * North-West Land Division * South-West Land Division

Wine regions

Western Australia covers the western third of the continent, although the winemaking regions are almost entirely situated in the south-western tip of the state. It has nine regions, and five nominated subregions for wine under the

geographical indication A geographical indication (GI) is a name or sign used on products which corresponds to a specific geographical location or origin (e.g., a town or region). The use of a geographical indication, as an indication of the product's source, is inten ...

s legislation as determined by the Australian Wine and Brandy Corporation.T. Stevenson ''"The Sotheby's Wine Encyclopedia"'' pg 589 Dorling Kindersley 2005 Australian Wine and Brandy corporation – Western Australia
winepros.com.au, ''The Oxford Companion to Wine'' pg 76
Western Australia
Wine regions include: *Greater Perth ** Perth Hills ** Peel ** Swan District *South Western Australia ** Blackwood Valley ** Geographe ** Great Southern *** Albany ***

Denmark Denmark is a Nordic countries, Nordic country in Northern Europe. It is the metropole and most populous constituent of the Kingdom of Denmark,, . also known as the Danish Realm, a constitutionally unitary state that includes the Autonomous a ...

*** Frankland River *** Mount Barker *** Porongurup ** Manjimup **

Margaret River The Margaret River is a river in southwest Australia, southwest Western Australia. In a small catchment, it is the eponym of the town and tourist region of Margaret River, Western Australia, Margaret River. The river arises from a catchment ...

** Pemberton

Coastal regions

Western Australia has the longest coastline of any state in Australia, at . The regions can be determined by the underlying geology, and in the case of the Bureau of Meteorology – features such as points and capes are useful indicators of coastal water forecasts.

Landgate The Western Australian Land Information Authority operates under the business name of Landgate. Formerly known as the Department of Land Information (DLI), the Department of Land Administration (DOLA) and the Department of Lands and Surveys ( ...

publishes touring maps that include coastal zones including: *

Batavia Coast Batavia Coast is a name attributed to a section of the coastline of Western Australia, in the region close to the vicinity of the site of the wreck of the ''Batavia (1628 ship), Batavia'' in the Houtman Abrolhos, Abrolhos Islands. It lies nort ...

(incorporating the area of Dongara, Geraldton, and Kalbarri) * Coral Coast (at the northern end of the Gascoyne Coast) * Gascoyne Coast (Carnarvon, Coral Bay, Denham, Exmouth and the Coral Coast) * Turquoise Coast north of sunset Coast and south of Batavia coast * Sunset Coast (Perth Metropolitan beachside suburbs from Cottesloe to Yanchep)

Census and Australian Bureau of Statistics

For the purposes of statistical geography, the

Australian Bureau of Statistics The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) is an List of Australian Government entities, Australian Government agency that collects and analyses statistics on economic, population, Natural environment, environmental, and social issues to advi ...

uses the

Australian Standard Geographical Classification The Census in Australia, officially the Census of Population and Housing, is the national census in Australia that occurs every five years. The census collects key demographic, social and economic data from all people in Australia on census nig ...

, a hierarchical regionalisation that divides Western Australia into statistical divisions, then statistical subdivisions, statistical local areas, and finally,

census collection district A census (from Latin ''censere'', 'to assess') is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording, and calculating population information about the members of a given population, usually displayed in the form of statistics. This term is used ...

s. Statistical divisions include: * SD 505 – Perth * SD 510 – South West * SD 515 – Lower Great Southern * SD 520 – Upper Great Southern * SD 525 – Midlands * SD 530 – South Eastern * SD 535 – Central * SD 540 – Pilbara * SD 545 – Kimberley The ABS produces regional profiles for the nine ABS statistical divisions, and the ten Development Commission regions.

Cross-regional terminology

In some cases, regions have been grouped into larger areas, to describe a larger area in a single term: * ''Arid Western Australia'' tends to be synonymous with the Eremaean province biological region relating to plants and dry conditions * ''

Remote Western Australia Remote Western Australia is a designation of areas of Western Australia that are either isolated or well away from the main concentrations of population and services found in the south west of the state. The usage of the phrase ''remote Western A ...

''also synonymous with ''Outback Western Australia''is determined by the distance and separation from the more heavily populated south west region surrounding

Perth Perth () is the list of Australian capital cities, capital city of Western Australia. It is the list of cities in Australia by population, fourth-most-populous city in Australia, with a population of over 2.3 million within Greater Perth . The ...

and its adjacent hinterland, and the subsequent scattered and low density populated areas towards the central east of Western Australia. * '' North West Australia'' similarly crosses the usual regional definitions to designate an area. * ''

Southwest Australia Southwest Australia is a biogeographic region in Western Australia. It includes the Mediterranean-climate area of southwestern Australia, which is home to a diverse and distinctive flora and fauna. The region is also known as the Southwest Au ...

'' may also ignore usual regional definitions. * '' Nullarbor''a term with multiple meanings covers between south east Western Australia, and far west South Australia.

References

External links

Fisheries – recreational fishing regions

Maps

* ''Streetsmart Travellers Atlas of Western Australia'' (2006) Department of Land Information and West Australian Newspapers,9th ed. * Quality Publishing Australia.(2007) ''Roads & tracks Western Australia: campsites directory, roads and tracks, all in one'' Jolimont, W.A., Quality Publishing Australia, 5th ed * ''UBD Western Australia country road atlas'' (2005) Macquarie Park, N.S.W.UBD, a division of Universal Publishers, 11th ed {{Western Australian regions