The Australia-China Council booklet is also available in Chinese text as a pdf document. The Council is funded by Parliament and supported by a Secretariat based in the East Asia Branch of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade in Canberra. The Council meets around four times a year to discuss issues in the bilateral relationship, decide on funding priorities and monitor implementation of its decisions. Council Members are drawn from various sectors of the Australian community and are appointed by the Governor-General on the recommendation of the Minister for Foreign Affairs.
Members have a specific area of expertise relevant to the development of Australia-China relations.
The Council is currently comprised of members with business, media, arts, education and legal backgrounds. These are intended to enable postgraduate students at an institution in China to spend a period of six months in Australia conducting field work as part of their postgraduate program. Students will remain enrolled in their home institution but will have the opportunity to visit Australia and attach themselves to a university in Australia in order to further their work and to collect primary materials on the topic on which they are working. The studentships will be awarded competitively. There will be two or three Studentships available in 2001.