Asian languages and Australia's economy

Sydney Morning Herald has an interesting article today about language education in Australia. Hugh White, a professor at Australian National University, argued that it's better for Australia's economy to send young people to learn Asian languages in the source countries.

That is a lot of money, but $375 million is less than 5 per cent of the $8 billion a year that Australia's rapidly growing overseas aid budget is planned to reach over the next decade. This is where the money should be found. We need to ask whether our future in Asia might be better secured by spending a bit less on teaching our neighbours how to do things, and a bit more on learning about them.

Press here to read more. What's your opinion on this?