I write this week from Australia, where I spent about a month exploring this fascinating continent, visiting several of its states and territories, including Victoria, New South Wales, Queensland, and Northern Territory, having visited the capital Canberra before.

I saw some breathtaking natural wonders in nearly every part of the country, from Queensland’s rainforest, Great Barrier Reef, and Gold Coast to the Northern Territory deserts and canyons, to New South Wales harbors and Blue Mountains, to Victoria’s Philip Island and Great Ocean Road. During my visits, I heard and sensed Australia’s desire, at both the official and private levels, to engage with the rest of the world, including the GCC and its member states, as a most dynamic group of countries and major source of energy, capital and entrepreneurship.

I tried to assess the key promising areas for expanding GCC-Australia partnership. My observations confirmed my earlier suspicion that the current levels of GCC-Australia engagement, whether at the bilateral level with individual member states or at the collective GCC level, do not match the great potential that the two sides possess.

The GCC and Australia have been engaged in an exploration exercise that included wide-ranging ministerial discussions and consultations on regional and international issues, as well as discussions between experts in all fields of potential cooperation. In March 2011, they signed a memorandum of understanding for “strategic dialogue.”

Based on that understanding, a 3-year “joint action plan” was agreed upon to map out cooperation in economic, political, cultural and educational fields, as well as energy and the environment. Under that plan of action, several meetings have been held or planned, including a meeting scheduled for later this month between GCC and Australia foreign ministers in New York, and senior official meetings in Australia next month. Several areas hold significant potential for win-win cooperation, economically, politically and culturally.

To start with economics, Australia is a land of superlatives in many ways. Its continental size (7.7 million sq km) makes it the sixth largest country in the world. For comparison, it is 22 times the size of Germany, but has less than one third of Germany’s population. Because of its relatively small population (23 million), it is one of the most sparsely populated countries, especially in its western and northern regions. This low density accounts, in part, for Australia’s relatively liberal migration policy.

As a result, Australia today is one of the most diverse countries in the world. Its population hails from about (170) different countries and lives in relative harmony. The Middle East can learn a lot from the Australian experience in managing diversity over the past two decades, after its earlier failed experiments in dealing with Aborigines.

Economically, Australia is a powerhouse. It is a member of the G20 group, which it plans to host in Brisbane in mid-November 2014. Its gross domestic product is estimated at (1.5) trillion US dollars, making it the 12th largest economy in the world.

Australia’s per capita GDP, at $66,000, is the 5th highest in the world, after Luxembourg, Qatar, Norway and Switzerland. This high level of income, more than the total number of its population, makes a better indicator about its market size.

During my visits to Australia, especially this one, I experienced its rich cultural diversity and sophisticated art scene, not only in large metropolitan centers such as Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane, but in small towns and faraway outposts, such as Cairns, Palm Cove, Kundera, Alice Springs and Uluru. The rich cultural texture of Australia provides great opportunities for people-to-people engagement of the highest order. Australia is blessed with abundant natural resources. It is rich with minerals, and diverse fauna and flora, not found anywhere in the world.

The GCC and Australia’s combined GDP of (3.3) trillion dollars provides greater opportunities for trade and investment than we have now. Incomprehensibly, GCC-Australia trade and investment flows have been quite modest. In 1992, trade in goods totaled merely $1.8 billion. It remained in the (2-3) billion range until 2002. Since then, their two-way trade has quadrupled to reach $12 billion in 2013. Since 1997, Australia has maintained a persistent surplus in trade with the GCC, although that surplus has been shrinking in recent years.

However, the current levels of trade are still low; they pale compared to GCC trade with China, for example, or India or Korea. Two decades ago, GCC-Australia trade was nearly at the same level as GCC-China trade. But today, GCC trade with China exceeds $170 billion, or (14) times GCC-Australia trade.

While the two sides try to maximize their trade exchange in goods, it is more important to explore the potential for trade in services and investment, where a greater potential exists. Partnerships between Etihad Airways and Virgin Australia and between Emirates and Qantas are but two examples of possible partnerships between GCC and Australian service providers.

Significant opportunities abound in the energy, mining and agricultural sectors to benefit from the comparative advantages that each side has. For example, Australia has considerable experience in dry land farming, something that GCC countries can benefit from.

GCC-Australia investment and services partnerships do not have to be deployed only in Australia and GCC countries. The two sides could combine their efforts to invest in other countries. One case in point is the possibilities that exist in agricultural investment in developing countries to help them improve their production capacities and reduce global food shortages. In addition to their economic significance, Australia and the GCC have become increasingly active international and regional players. Political and security cooperation has become a priority given also the two sides’ commitment to fight terrorism and piracy.

People-to-people exchanges should also be an important part of this promising relationship, including education, tourism, and cultural dialogue. But this is the topic for another essay.

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