Our first sister city partnership was formed with Osaka in 1978, and has since expanded to include four more cities. Our multicultural communities and the city as a whole have been nourished by their influence.
Our partnership with Osaka began in 1978, to establish 'a people-to-people relationship with the aim of developing mutual friendships and a lasting and understanding relationship'.
In recent years Melbourne has developed strong business ties with Osaka, particularly in the Life Sciences and Health sectors. We continue to facilitate two way trade between the cities.
The City of Melbourne has strong ties with Osaka trade agencies such as International Business Promotion Centre and Osaka Business and Investment Center. These agencies can assist potential Melbourne exporters with:
Since 1980, Melbourne has enjoyed a very positive sister city relationship with Tianjin. This has generated many positive economic, educational and cultural activities and outcomes for both cities, facilitated by our dedicated office in Tianjin.
Initially much of our association with Tianjin was cultural, educational and sporting. However, since 1987 we have taken a more business-focused approach and developed strategies to enhance the people-to-people networks we had established for the benefit of both parties.
One of the major initiatives to come out of the sister city relationship has been the Tianjin Government Leaders Program, which began in 2001 and is run in association with RMIT. Under this program up to 20 senior business and government leaders are sent to Melbourne by Tianjin municipal government, to take part in a 12-week business management course at RMIT University.
Melbourne's sister city relationship with Thessaloniki recognises Melbourne's large and dynamic Greek community and helps to reinforce the many similarities between these two great port cities.
Melbourne is home to the largest Greek-speaking population outside of Europe, and has strong connections to Greece. Melbourne and Thessaloniki have enjoyed a sister city for more than 30 years, formalising ties in 1984.
For more information about Thessaloniki, visit:
Melbourne and Boston are both knowledge cities and are connected by a common commitment to excellence in healthcare and biotechnology, startups and innovation, liveability and education.
2020 marked the 35th anniversary of the Melbourne-Boston sister city relationship.
Melbourne Boston Sister Cities Association (MBSCA), an independent incorporated community association, was founded in 1985. The MBSCA plays a key role in promoting educational exchanges between Melbourne and Boston. These are awarded annually in the fields of medical research, the arts and education and aim to enhance Melbourne and Boston’s reputations as centres of knowledge excellence and to strengthen the ties between our two cities.
Sharing passions for food, fashion, sport and culture, Melbourne and Milan are natural economic and cultural partners.
The City of Melbourne continues to support Melbourne Movement in its endeavours to participate in the annual Salone Internazionale del Mobile (Milan Furniture Fair), the world's premier furniture, lighting and home accessory exhibition. Established in 1999 by Professor Kjell Grant of RMIT University, Melbourne Movement is a not-for-profit collective whose aim is to foster the design excellence of young Victorian-based designers, both locally and internationally.
Melbourne's engagement with India commenced when a strategic alliance with the National Capital Territory Government of New Delhi was formally acknowledged in 2008, the first of its kind between an Australian capital city and an Indian city. The alliance serves as a gateway for the City of Melbourne into India, expanding relationships with industry associations and business.
In 2011, we strengthened our ties with India through an International Engagement Framework: India Statement. The statement outlines strategic guidelines for our engagement with India, to strengthen our long-standing trade and cultural relationship.
Our current approach for India is to take a sector focus, matching Melbourne's industry capabilities to India's requirements and create opportunities to facilitate exposure of Melbourne businesses to key players and decision makers in India.
In the short term, we’re pursuing opportunities in sustainable urban design and clean technologies, aligned with the Indian government's bold '100 Smart Cities' strategy. As part of our '100 Smart Cities' initiative, we’ve hosted three inbound delegations (2015, 2016, 2018) and led an outbound business mission to India (2017) focused on the themes of liveability and smart cities, water and waste management and urban design).
We recognise the strategic importance of Indonesia as the largest economy in Southeast Asia and one of our nearest neighbours, and are looking to grow our Indonesian engagement.
We’ve identified Bandung as a city that shares strong alignment with Melbourne in a number of key sectors, including smart cities, liveability, creative economy, startups and innovation. Our current approach is to identify potential opportunities for collaboration in these areas of mutual interest, to highlight Melbourne’s industry capabilities and promote Melbourne businesses.
The Business Partner Cities (BPC) network helps promote business interaction within the Asia–Pacific region, contributing to economic development of each member city.
Its aim is to create opportunities for small to medium sized enterprises to establish links with their counterparts throughout the network.
Activities that occur under the banner of BPC include:
Melbourne’s participation in the network is currently administered by the City of Melbourne and the Australian Industry Group. This role includes:
For further details about any of these agreements, please contact our Economic Development and International Branch via email: global@melbourne.vic.gov.au.
MoU on strengthening cooperation between Suzhou and CoM
Collaboration to promote startups and startup ecosystem development and encouragement of official and civic exchanges in liveability, culture, education and trade.
MoU on the 2020-2022 Three-Year Cultural and Creative Industries Cooperation Plan between City of Melbourne and City of Suzhou
Suzhou and Melbourne agree to capitalise on the opportunity presented by Suzhou Design Week to promote the implementation of creative and cultural cooperation projects between the two cities and to promote friendly exchanges and cooperation between the two governments, businesses and peoples.
The City of Melbourne respectfully acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the land we govern, the Wurundjeri Woi-wurrung and Bunurong / Boon Wurrung peoples of the Kulin and pays respect to their Elders past and present. We acknowledge and honour the unbroken spiritual, cultural and political connection they have maintained to this unique place for more than 2000 generations.
We accept the invitation in the Uluru Statement from the Heart and are committed to walking together to build a better future.