The vast north-west of the Australian continent covers one million square kilometres over the Kimberley, Pilbara and Gascoyne.

It contains the world’s greatest mineral province with enormous reserves of iron ore, natural gas, oil, lithium, copper, gold, cobalt, manganese, zinc, lead, rare earths and other minerals vital for today’s technological society.

Here, hundreds of billions of dollars are invested in mines, ports, offshore facilities and huge gas plants.

In the last year this region exported $140 billion of resource products – nearly one half of Australia’s export total. It fronts the Indian Ocean, with 35 other countries and nearly 3 billion people. Two-thirds of the world’s seaborne trade in oil, 50 per cent of the world’s seaborne container traffic and one-third of the world’s seaborne bulk cargo pass through this.

The sea-route from the Indonesian archipelago through Australia’s north-west Maritime Jurisdiction is heavily trafficked, carrying over 900 million tonnes of our exports north each year.

But the area is sparsely populated, with approximately 100,000 people and only a few dozen Defence personnel.

The north-west needs a larger and more visible military presence to maintain the security and integrity of our greatest export industry.