Australia has slightly more than 2.5 per cent of the world’s gambling machines, infinitely less than the often-quoted 20 per cent by industry opponents.

Australia

This is one of the findings from the 2018 annual World Count of Gaming Machines survey that has just been issued.

Carried out on behalf of the Gaming Technologies Association, the World Count, sourced from regulatory bodies, government sources, private company research, gaming industry bodies and directly from locations where machines are installed, confirms that Australian gaming machines have some of the world’s lowest maximum bet limits.

The world, says the report, has 7,789,679 gaming machines of which Australia has 197,021, or 2.53 per cent of the legally installed machines.

Japan has the most (pachislot and pachinko) at 4.52 million, followed by the US with 884,239, Italy with 463,931, Germany with 274,500, Spain with 201,381, Australia with 197,021, the UK with 182,916, Canada with 100,591, Argentina with 98,117 and Peru with 84,396.

The allegation made by many opponents of the industry in Australia that the country has the highest density of machines per capita is also debunked by the report. St Maarten in the Caribbean has just 13 people per machine and the Aland Islands in Finland has 16. Japan has 28, Monaco 31 and China’s Macau jurisdiction has 37. Australia comes in at 10th with 125 people per machine.

Ross Ferrar, CEO of Australia’s GTA, which put together the data, said: “The World Count of Gaming Machines 2018 is a valuable source of factual data about global gaming machine numbers.

“The 2017 edition of the world-wide survey of gaming machine numbers once again dispels myths around gaming machine numbers in Australia.

“The machines that are counted in this survey are those that are legally installed. Where illegal machines exist, or where there is no regulation, the count is only based on the numbers of machines that can be verified. The survey also includes additional information, such as maximum bet limits.

“This survey confirms that Australian gaming machines have some of the world’s lowest maximum bet limits which is consistent with what we have found in previous surveys.”