Australian Bureau of Statistics figures for 2008-09 show that Australian exploration spend fell by 9.7% to $2.223 billion from a record high of $2.46 billion in the previous financial year.

Geoscience Australia said the figures showed that falls in uranium, base metals and, surprisingly, gold were offset by rises in iron ore and coal spend.

Iron ore expenditure came to $589 million, up more than 30%, while coal expenditure grew by $297 million, up almost 27%.

The government’s official geoscience group said, compared to worldwide trends compiled by the Metals Economics Group, Australia didn’t look too shabby – worldwide, spend dropped 42% from a record $US14.4 billion to $8.4 billion, although these figures don’t include coal and iron expenditure.

This was the first reduction after six years of growth in global exploration spending.

In Western Australia, exploration spend dropped by only 1% thanks to the iron ore industry, whereas spending in Queensland dropped 11.6% and by 7.7% in New South Wales.

In the Northern Territory, expenditure actually rose by some 10%, while in South Australia and Tasmania the falls were closer to 30%.

Geoscience Australia said the figures demonstrated that brownfields projects remained the focus of exploration, with grassroots work accounting for only 33.8% of all exploration spend.

Unsurprisingly, with exploration spend reduced, the numbers of metres drilled also fell.

Exploration drilling fell by 19% to 7.9 million metres in the 2009 financial year. Greenfields drilling dropped by 30.6% to 2.72 million metres, while brownfields drilling dropped by only 11.5% to 6.2 million metres.