Recognising and Protecting Indigenous Values in Water Resource Management

superuser — Tue, 14 Jul 2009 02:56:05 +0000

A two-day workshop on Indigenous cultural values and water resource management was held at CSIRO in Darwin, NT in April 2006, with the aim of exploring what Indigenous managers of water resources in northern Australia could learn from other regions where water has been developed. The workshop attracted participants from the Northern Territory, Western Australia, Queensland, South Australia and the ACT. Several institutions were represented, including Aboriginal communities, Aboriginal land management bodies, conservation and natural resource management agencies, research organisations, the Northern Land Council, the Kimberley Land Council and the Aboriginal Areas Protection Authority of the NT.

IDs and People

Program:

Social and Institutional Research Program

Tropical Rivers Research and Development

Program Theme:

Indigenous Natural Resources Management

Subjects

Subjects:

Indigenous

Water (General)

Keywords:

cultural resource management

Project Information

Summary:

The project contained a number of components and attendant methodological approaches. Firstly, it entailed a substantial communication effort directed towards representative Aboriginal organisations (NLC and the Daly River Aboriginal Reference Group (ARG)), NT government hydrologists and water resource managers and via presentations in research forums. Face-to-face interviews, small discussion groups and large group meetings were held over the course of the project, as was a workshop with inter-state representation from Indigenous people. Innovative communication materials, tailored to Aboriginal people’s literacy and numeracy levels, were developed to address the high level of ignorance of water resource institutions and management processes. Effort was made to communicate the project’s rationale, objectives and results at numerous scientific/river management conferences and in publications (see below).

Literature reviews of Australian and international experience in addressing Indigenous peoples’ requirements for water were undertaken (see attached report). Environmental flow assessment in South Africa and New Zealand appear to be the most advanced in addressing cultural differences and are therefore of most interest for their application to the Daly region and other Australian cases. In so far as possible with a desk-top review, close attention was given to the way in which ‘cultural values’ have been defined, interpreted, framed within the environmental planning process, and the role of Indigenous or local knowledge in assessment processes.

Daly River Aboriginal values were explored through open-ended interviews and through interpretation of people’s statements and corporate positions taken at workshops, public meetings and internal meetings. Environmental knowledge, including philosophy and cosmology, plays an important part in defining the terms of an environmental dispute or controversy, and in determining the authority and ability of various players to affect change. The project sought to provide information derived from Western science in a manner that did not undermine the validity and worth of Aboriginal systems of knowledge (see IAH poster). The plain English story books produced during the project enabled readers, Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal, to reflect on how people come to know things as well as what they know. This cross-cultural approach was extended to the analysis of social and cultural values and the contemporary constraints on addressing Indigenous requirements in resource management contexts (Jackson 2005a; 2006). Results from this analysis were discussed with Aboriginal people in dialogue over many months, with NT and Commonwealth policy-makers during meetings (NTRETA and NWC), other researchers at conferences, and in the final workshop in April. Two journal articles were produced from this component of the project.

The project experienced some delays that were unanticipated. Ensuring the accuracy of environmental planning and hydrological information and the simplification of complex concepts took longer than expected (requiring input from numerous people in NTRETA). Nonetheless, the final products (2 plain English story books) were of a high standard and were very well received.

Consistent with action-based research methods the project was responsive to changes in direction suggested by the ARG. Late in the project strong interest was expressed in using oral histories to reveal the connections between people and place and this slight change in orientation to the project has affected achievement of objective 2 (as discussed below). I sought to employ local Indigenous researchers to conduct these interviews. This resulted in some delays (e.g. meeting training needs) and the outcome was adversely affected by staff change-over and inexperience. As well, documenting the traditional knowledge of the river system proved more difficult than anticipated in the time frame initially proposed. The survey of the mythical-spiritual landscape, to be funded by the NLC has not yet been completed because the consultant anthropologist fell seriously ill during 2005.

Current Activities

Status:

Complete

Background

Project Background:

Water allocation processes across tropical Australia are struggling with the question of how to acknowledge and protect Aboriginal values and interests in water-dependent ecosystems. Indigenous interests in environmental flows research and water resource policy have tended to be neglected, consequently Aboriginal people have rarely participated equitably in water management decision-making. This project was conceived as a pilot with the intention of engaging Aboriginal traditional owners and resource managers in applied research and problem – solving. It examined international sociological approaches to environmental flow assessment and water management and developed a framework for addressing Australian Indigenous interests. The project provided funds for community engagement and products to raise awareness of hydrological science and water management institutions amongst the Aboriginal community of the Daly River. Academic publications conveyed results from the project and a workshop held in Darwin on cultural values and water, generated dialogue between water resource managers, researchers, and Aboriginal people from numerous Australian regions.

Aims:

Ensure Aboriginal people in a significant section of the Daly River catchment understand the contemporary water resource management regime, especially water allocation planning
Demonstrate how Aboriginal environmental knowledge can contribute to the determination of environmental water requirements
Define the Indigenous cultural values of water and investigate the means for incorporating and protecting cultural values in the Daly River water allocation plan
Develop and communicate a generic framework and methods from the Daly experience for use in other tropical catchments, and where Indigenous interests are similar.

These objectives were met through close collaboration with, and financial support from, the peak Aboriginal organisation, the Northern Land Council (NLC), and the NT Department of Resources, Environment and the Arts (NTRETA).

Resources

External Links:

Recognising and protecting Indigenous values in water resource management (CSIRO)

All in cultural resource management

Recognising and Protecting Indigenous Values in Water Resource Management