A new report has found seven of Australia's major universities are depending on foreign students for their financial survival - a position leaving them vulnerable to political, reputational and financial international changes, it claims.
According to the report, released on Wednesday, the financial risk of the universities' reliance on China ran into the hundreds of millions of dollars annually, with Chinese student course fees accounting for between 13 and 23 per cent of their total revenues.
The author of the report, Salvatore Babones, told SBS News the problem wasn't that the students were Chinese, but that "there is so many of them".
"It's healthy to have foreign students, the problem is when you have so many foreign students that you depend on them for your financial survival," he said.
