Australia’s population. Review

Australia’s native people are the Aboriginal peoples (today also called Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples); they arrived tens of thousands of years ago, lived by hunting and gathering, and did no farming or herding. After the first British settlers came to Sydney in 1788, many Aboriginal people were pushed onto dry, unfavourable land. Most of today’s population are descendants of Europeans and speak English; many migrants have also come from Asia. The population is about 27 million and the density is very low (about 3–4 people per km²), because much of the continent is desert. People are concentrated on the eastern, south-eastern and south-western coasts, especially in big cities such as Sydney and Melbourne (about 40 % of the population lives in these two). After the Europeans arrived, Australian nature changed quickly: roads, fields, wheat fields, vineyards and olive groves appeared; introduced species such as the rabbit (1859), fox and cane toad did great harm to native nature; the Tasmanian tiger (thylacine) became extinct in 1936. National parks and reserves have been set up to protect rare species (including the Great Barrier Reef Marine Park).