IT budgets in the Australian business landscape are shrinking, despite IT budgets rising globally, according to Gartner's latest annual chief information officer (CIO) survey. According to the 2014 CIO Agenda: An Australia Perspective report, the country's IT budgets are collectively contracting by approximately 0.1 percent. Meanwhile, globally, IT budgets are on the rise at around 0.2 percent. The survey found that Australian IT leaders faced "significant challenges" compared to their global counterparts, with Australian IT leaders having less money with which to fund growth. "A closer look at IT spending shows 26 percent of IT spending will be outside of the IT budget. This could raise integration issues in the short term and governance issues in the long term," said Gartner. The survey also found that Australian organisations had fewer chief digital officers — 1.8 percent compared to an average of 6.6 percent globally — outsource less, and consume fewer public cloud services than worldwide averages.