Native wisdom
Across Australia, indigenous knowledge is bolstering endeavours in farming, conservation and healthcare.
THICK WHITE SMOKE billows skyward from an unruly understorey of spinifex and dead branches. Fire takes hold in the wattle trees, generating shimmering walls of heat and crackling flames within metres of rock art that could be 30,000 years old. “This place hasn’t been burnt for years,” says Aboriginal ranger Dean Yibarbuk, gesturing over what is part of Kunbambuk estate in the stone country of western Arnhem Land. “If it’d been left any longer the fuel load would’ve been heavier and those paintings might not have survived a wildfire.”
Dean is a ranger with Warddeken Land Management, set up by traditional owners to manage conservation work in the Warddeken Indigenous Protected Area (IPA) – 13,950 sq.km of stone-and-gorge country on the Arnhem Land plateau. Dean was bequeathed Kunbambuk from the last sur vivor of the Barradj clan. He and his family – many of whom are also rangers – have been brought here by helicopter to camp for a week, map rock-art sites and burn the country. Regular controlled burns help protect the landscape from fires, which generate intense heat and are one of the biggest threats to ancient records of history.
The rangers, who are based at Kabulwarnamyo, about 330km south-east of Darwin, spend much of the year fighting and preventing wildfires on the plateau. Their work ensures the safety of rock art and protects the region’s fragile sandstone heaths and shrublands – home to hundreds of endemic species, including the white-throated grass wren, black wallaroo, Oenpelli python and anbinik tree ( Allosyncarpia ternata). Since the late 1990s, these rangers and their families have shared traditional knowledge with scientists to establish a blueprint for managing the land in ways that reduce greenhouse gas emissions. It has since been adopted by other northern and central Australian communities and has led to lucrative partnerships with large-scale businesses.
Combining traditional knowledge and modern industry isn’t new. Since the 1970s emergence of the contemporary Aboriginal art movement (see AG 131), indigenous artists have combined ancient designs and processes with Western media, materials and distribution methods. Today, the multi-million dollar industry is essential to the survival of many bush communities.
As industries of all kinds become increasingly focused on sustainability, Aboriginal Australians are now also attracting the attention of scientists, governments and the world’s largest companies. A growing number of communities are sharing knowledge of Australia’s ecology to further research and development in land management, agriculture, healthcare, pharmaceuticals and cosmetics. These collaborations encourage innovation, help protect Australia’s landscapes, and offer Aboriginal communities opportunities to live and work on country.
Aboriginal fire managers have improved savannah burning on the plateau, reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
FIRE MANAGEMENT ON the Arnhem Land plateau is a good example of successful collaboration between traditional owners, researchers and businesspeople. Known as ‘savannah burning’, it draws on traditional knowledge of using fire to manage country with low rainfall. Aboriginal people had ably managed the plateau with fire for millennia, but left or were coerced to live in communities closer to the coast in the late 1800s and early 1900s. It left the plateau unpopulated for decades and wildfires raged, regularly destroying large areas.
Then, from the mid-1970s, traditional owners led by Bardayal Lofty Nadjamerrek returned to the plateau and resumed age-old land-management practices, restoring balance in ‘sick country’. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, ranger groups were formed and funded at the same time as interest was rising in climate change. Researchers quickly saw that regular controlled burns significantly reduced the damage and carbon emissions of large, destructive wildfires. As a result, savannah burning was supported by the federal government’s Emissions Reduction Fund, which purchases carbon credits from groups that can prove they have reduced greenhouse gas emissions.
In 2006 traditional owners brokered an agreement with the Northern Land Council (NLC), the Northern Territory government and multinational energy corporation Conoco Phillips. They arranged to use their carbon credits to offset emissions generated by the company’s LNG plant in Darwin. Conoco Phillips agreed to pay Aboriginal fire managers in western Arnhem Land for carbon offsets to the tune of $1 million a year for 17 years. Known as the WALFA (West Arnhem Land Fire Abatement) project, this innovative collaboration was Australia’s first carbon offset program based on savannah burning.
Since 2006 Aboriginal fire managers have improved the efficiency of savannah burning on the plateau, further reducing annual greenhouse gas emissions and almost doubling the carbon credits they earn. In 2015 traditional owners established the Arnhem Land Fire Abatement company to trade the additional carbon credits and organise the flow of money to five groups in the west and south Arnhem Land regions: the Adjumarlarl rangers of Kunbarlanja, Djelk rangers from Maningrida, Warddeken rangers of the plateau, Jawoyn rangers from Katherine and Mimal rangers from Bulman.
The WALFA project was not only a triumph of cooperation and goodwill, it also improved the landscape, created employment opportunities for Aboriginal people and facilitated the resurgence of traditional burning regimes. For the Warddeken rangers, income from carbon credits goes towards other essential land-management projects such as weed and feral animal control and protection of rock art.The group has also built a school so children living in the small settlement of Kabulwarnamyo don’t have to travel to the townships of Kunbarlanja and Maningrida. They follow a curriculum that mixes mainstream education with traditional knowledge.
ANOTHER INNOVATIVE collaboration involves the Bidyadanga Aboriginal Community – about 180km south of Broome, Western Australia. This year they picked their first commercial Kakadu plum harvest from 250 trees planted in a community garden several years ago as part of a Kimberley Training Institute (KTI) program.
The first harvest of just 200kg of this native fruit was fairly small. But its cultivation in a plantation was ground-breaking and may herald the beginning of a multi-million dollar industry that could underpin agriculture centred on native foods in northern Australia in future decades.
Kakadu plum grows wild across northern Australia in places where many other plants struggle.The fruit is a traditional food and medicine known as gubinge in the west and mi marrarl and billy goat plum in the east. With one of the highest Vitamin C levels of any fruit, it is shaping up as an antioxidant-r ich ‘superfood’ recognised for its anti-inflammatory and antibacterial properties, and as a natural preservative. Demand in the health food and food supplement markets is already high, but expected to escalate in coming years as cosmetic, nutraceutical and pharmaceutical companies explore its potential.
Kakadu plum is gathered primarily from Aboriginal lands, often by Aboriginal women who walk through the bush after the Wet, picking it from trees that grow to about 3m. Around Darwin, non-Aboriginal pickers target Crown Land or pay a royalty for gathering on Aboriginal country, and can earn $10 to $20 per kilo. Some plums are frozen and shipped south or overseas. Other fruit is converted to a puree or powder, selling for $400 to $500 per kilo. About 10kg of fresh plums creates just 1kg of powder. In a good year, there is potential to harvest 100 tonnes across the north.
Kim Courtenay, a horticulturalist with KTI in Broome, believes Kakadu plum could underpin the economies of remote Aboriginal communities. Through practical training programs he and traditional owners around Broome have planted nearly 2000 trees during the past decade, many in the Bidyadanga township. Kim has also developed a technique called ‘savannah enrichment’, where trees are planted within existing landscapes.
“The prospect of planting within existing bush works well,” he says, explaining that it enables commercial crops to be cultivated without destroying bushland and allows Aboriginal communities to retain links with their traditional culture. “People like being on country and are happy in the bush growing gubinge.”
The Kakadu plum industry is growing rapidly and Kim says that ensuring Aboriginal people remain at its forefront is a priority. “We think Kakadu plum is a potential world-beater but there is a sense of urgency. We have to stake the claim as an Aboriginal initiative and an Aboriginal industry. A big marketing strength is that it is a wild product and an indigenous product.”
The Rural Industries Research and Development Corporation (RIRDC) is funding a program to establish the genetic variability of the plant and work with Aboriginal communities to enhance cultivation. Dr John de Majnik, RIRDC senior program manager, says initial studies have found there may be different species with different properties that could be selectively sought after by different markets. He is working with Aboriginal
communities to develop innovative methods for sustainably harvesting fruit for different markets. “There are opportunities for Aboriginal communities to utilise and harness this production with trademarks, fair trade and provenance opportunities,” he says.
Wild Harvest NT’s David Boehme believes commercial volumes of Kakadu plum are not achievable through wild harvests. He expects the fruit will eventually be grown in plantations. “Aboriginal people are the largest owners of the appropriate land available,” he says. “I see communities going into partnerships with global companies based on long-term relationships.”
At Wadeye, 400km south-west of Darwin, Aboriginal women from the Palngun Wurnangat Association have purchased specialised equipment and registered a patent to process the fruit. Margot Northey, the association’s general manager, says the women are interested in a wild harvest because planting seeds and picking fruit in the wild is an excellent way to generate employment, keep people on country and educate children about bush traditions. They foresee a cooperative future for plum harvesting, where Aboriginal communities across the north employ people to pick the fruit and send it to hubs, possibly in Darwin and Broome, for processing, sale and export.
IN NORTHERN NSW, people from the Githabul clan, whose traditional lands are around Kyogle, are collaborating with Lismore-based Native Extracts, which has links to complementary medicine company Blackmores. They are using new technology to extract water- and oil-soluble compounds from primarily Australian plants, particularly those known by Aboriginal people to have health benefits. So far, Native Extracts has created profiles for more than 60 native plants. Among them are Kakadu plum, quandong, muntrie, kangaroo apple, flame tree, finger lime and Davidson plum. Their focus on kangaroo apple is driven by the cosmetics industry, which sees potential for skin and hair care in extracts of the plant’s orange fruit.
Githabul elders Rob and Gloria Williams see the harvest of kangaroo apple as a way to create employment for young people and establish much-needed industry at Kyogle. “Not only will it help generate income but it will get people involved in a part of our culture and traditions, which will benefit the whole community, and protect our species,” Gloria says.
Lisa Carroll of Native Extracts says working closely with Aboriginal communities provides access to rare, non-commercial, wild-harvested crops. “To think we could get something from a wild harvest to a full commercial opportunity as an export market is exciting,” she says. “It is also about traceability, sustainability, community development and social responsibility. Many of our large international clients think along the same lines.”
AUSTRALIA’S FIRST EXPORT industry was centred on the sandy beaches and clear waters of Arnhem Land between the 17th and 19th centuries when the region attracted Macassan fishermen who harvested sea cucumber, or trepang. Today, Aboriginal people from Groote Eylandt and other communities along the Arnhem Land coast are looking to re-establish the industry in conjunction with a Tasmanian seafood company.
They aim to release juvenile sea cucumbers, grown as part of a research program at the Darwin Aquaculture Centre, into suitable shallow bays to enhance and breed with wild stocks, and then to harvest them.
While the sea cucumber program still awaits approval from the NT government, another innovative project is underway near the borders of Kakadu National Park. Here, Top End herpetologist Dr Gavin Bedford is working with traditional owners of the East Alligator River region to capture and breed one of Australia’s rarest snakes, the Oenpelli python.
This slim, graceful snake can grow to 5.5m. A secretive and shy creature, it is restricted to western Arnhem Land, where it lives among sandstone outcrops and ventures into the tropical woodland to hunt, climbing into trees at night to ambush birds and small mammals.
Gavin and traditional owners were concerned the species could follow a wave of extinctions of small mammals in northern Australia. In 2011 the NT government granted Gavin permission to capture pythons from Aboriginal land in Kakadu NP so he could develop a captive-breeding program as insurance against the snake’s extinction.
Gavin established a unique breeding program whereby traditional owners receive a royalty for every snake collected and a further royalty for the hatchlings these animals produce. Gavin releases some of the pythons into the wild and sells others to approved collectors to generate funds – the species is eagerly sought by collectors and researchers. Breeding pairs are valued at up to $15,000.The breeding program is strictly controlled with each snake fitted with a microchip and its DNA registered. No adult pythons are permitted to leave the Territory.
Local traditional owner Fred Hunter says Aboriginal people support the captive-breeding program, not just because it is a source of potential income, but also a way to build numbers of a creature with a strong totemic value to the region.“The python was well known in this area by my ancestors and there are rock paintings of it in lots of places,” he says.“The arrival of cane toads and unchecked burning from previous times may have affected them. We want our young people to be able to see this animal back in the wild one day.”
Just like the savannah burning project on the Arnhem Land plateau, the Oenpelli python captive-breeding program is an example of innovation that demonstrates the benefits of collaborations between traditional owners, the NT government and the private sector. Such partnerships promote sustainability, encourage conservation, and provide Aboriginal people with opportunities to live and work on country.
Shaun Ansell, CEO of Warddeken Land Management, says these kinds of programs are “wonderful examples of indigenous innovation engaging in the marketplace and providing services that the world wants to pay for”. Shaun is full of praise for the way Aboriginal rangers on the Arnhem Land plateau manage their land, and for the way they have teamed up with businesses to generate funds to protect their country.
“Their work has been successful enough that it has become an example of best practice,” he says, referring to the Warddeken rangers’ burning regimes.“These activities are part of the solution – not just in Australia but in savannah regions worldwide.”