Value of the Not for Profit Sector in Australia - a Northern Territory Perspective

Not-for-Profit-Sector in Australia has emerged as a large and diverse sector covering activities and services including health, social services, education, arts, sports, human rights and culture. Despite its significance, it is hard to get an accurate snapshot of the contribution of this sector. It has escaped detailed academic scrutiny in the past few decades since its emergence. Traditional economic measures often don’t capture some of the most important work undertaken by this sector and hence are found inadequate. This paper attempts to identify key value indicators of the Not-for-Profit-Sector in an attempt to evaluate the economic and non-economic contribution from a Northern Territory perspective. Employing impact mapping and analysing data from detailed focus group discussions with industry leaders and top managers, this paper identifies immediate, short term and long term impacts of activities of Not-for-Profit-Sector. In this process, several unintended measures were also identified which have, in the past, been ignored by earlier studies.