Wellbeing should be about more than money and houses, Barr says

That's according to Cassandra Favager, Associate Director from Deloitte New Zealand's Social Impact Practice, who says the country has spent the last eight years developing a wellbeing model for policy advice.

She was in Canberra this week for a workshop on the ACT government's plans to develop its own wellbeing index, the first of its kind in the country.

Announcing the plans, ACT Chief Minister Andrew Barr said while measuring Canberra's economy was important, more attention was needed on other factors.

"Our wellbeing - both as individuals and as a community - is also determined by things like our environment, our connections to place and others, the quality of our services and institutions, how inclusive we are towards others and our preparedness to contend with future challenges and opportunities," he said.

He said the government was in the process of developing a draft set of indicators to take to public consultation later in the year.

The final Wellbeing Indicators will be launched on Canberra Day in 2020, and will form a benchmark for the annual budget process.

In the meantime, Ms Favager said Australia could learn a lot from New Zealand.

"The move to thinking about wellbeing is not a new one, and it is certainly not unique to New Zealand," she said.

"Wellbeing depends on more factors than public institutions and services alone, so leveraging those other factors is important if we want the framework to create real change for our families and communities."