SYDNEY, Oct. 8 (Xinhua) -- With more than one quarter of Australian's born overseas and many more coming from ethnically diverse backgrounds, the head of the country's national broadcaster has called for better representation on the organisation's mostly "white" board.
Chair of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC), Ita Buttrose, told ABC morning radio on Tuesday that many of Australia's institutions are not representative of its people.
"Much of the media is white and we're not all white," Buttrose said.
"Many Australians are not represented well enough and it's about time we change that."
Last year a report by the Australian Human Rights Commission found that while 24 percent of Australians came from non-European and Indigenous backgrounds, only five percent of senior leaders, such as CEOs, were from such backgrounds.
Buttrose said that the issue of ethnic diversity was one for all corporate leaders to tackle.
"Let's look at diversity. Do we have enough Asian representation? Should we have some Asians on the board? Do we have enough Middle Eastern representation? Should we have Middle Eastern representation on the board?" she said.
Last month Buttrose joined dozens of staff from the ABC's Sydney office who travelled to the outer suburb of Bankstown to experience one of Australia's most ethnically diverse communities.
According to a 2016 census, just 37 percent of Bankstown residents were born in Australia, with the suburb being home to 60 different language groups.
At the time Buttrose said that she hopes to represent, "as many views as possible on the ABC."
"Now that could be people who are Australian, people who are British, people who are Chinese, people who are Middle Eastern, you know, diversity covers a lot."
"That's the kind of Australia we have to reflect at the ABC."
