Victoria's regional areas have continued their steady increases in population, with 2021 Census data released to showing about 140,000 more people in Victoria's regions since the 2016 Census.
The latest figures show 1,576,613 Victorians now reside in areas outside of Melbourne, up from 1,433,818 in 2016.
Those in regional areas are older than people who live in the city, with the regional median age at 43, compared to 37 for those living in Melbourne, and 38 for the whole of Victoria.
Melbourne overwhelmingly had the largest decline in population of the capitals compared to the 2016 Census, with a 60,500 leaving the city, while Sydney also saw a decline of 5100 people.
But despite the decrease in population away from Melbourne, the city had huge increases in its outer metro areas with Cranbourne East region recording the third largest increase in population for whole nation, up by 5,000 people since the last 2016 census.
Other areas of major growth in Victoria include Mickleham-Yuroke (4100) in Melbourne's outer north and Rockbank-Mount Cottrell (3900) in Melbourne's outer west.
Regional Australia's population grew nearly one per cent compared to the 2016 with 70,900 new arrivals in the regions.
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Most other cities had steady or saw big increases, like Brisbane who had 21,870 new residents when the Census was conducted.
At the launch of Regional Institute Australia's Regional Movers Index for the March quarter earlier this month, the Institute's Kim Houghton said recent movement to the regions since the Census was still rising.
But he also said there is a slight trend of movement back to the cities since then too due to the tightening of the rental market in the regions.
"What's happened between March of last year and March this year is that essentially movement between cities have slowed and there's a slight increase in the proportion of those moving from cities to regions," Dr Houghton said.
"But there is a slight increase in people moving from the regions to the cities as well... and people are seeing it as a more favourable place."
The regions have seen a rise in the median weekly personal income from $576 in 2016 to $713 in 2021, while the median total weekly household income is also up from $1124 in 2016, to $1386 in 2021.
But this still lags behind Greater Melbourne residents who in 2021 had a personal weekly personal income of $841 and a household income of $1901.
The median monthly mortgage repayments for those in Victorian regional areas went up from $1350 in 2016, to $1477 in 2021.
Those involved in volunteer work outside of Melbourne has dropped to 224,430 volunteers compared to 285,320 in the 2016 Census data, in what is possibly a reflection that COVID related lockdowns have had.
Further data - including statistics related to agricultural sector - will be released in October.
