Last month I was honoured to be a part of the National First Peoples Gathering on Climate Change in Tubba-Gah/Dubbo (the Gathering).
The Gathering opened with a special Welcome to Country by Tubba-Gah Elder, Uncle Lewis Burns. While welcoming us, he said he hoped we’d have really good outcomes on Country, and we’d leave with a smile. It set the tone for the rest of the week.
This Gathering had a high number of younger attendees which, for me, was especially heartening. As a young Butchulla leader myself, I am glad to see more young people are getting involved in the climate space because we need to have a say in decisions that will impact us and our children. Since becoming a mum, my children certainly motivate me to try and influence decision makers.
On the final day, the younger people gathered in a breakout session. I loved seeing how capable and knowledgeable they all were. Importantly, I loved to see the respect with which they treated the older Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders. They were quick to acknowledge they are standing on the shoulders of giants, but they’re ready to shoulder the burden. And they know it is not a small burden to carry.
From a Butchulla perspective, we’re seeing dramatic and immediate impacts of climate change. We’re seeing changes in seasons and our resources are being depleted. Pre-colonisation, my Country sustained one of the highest populations per square kilometre. Today, I doubt you could sustain a single family if you relied solely on the environment. In 2020, we had the devastating bushfires. We’re trying to influence structures so we can conduct cultural burns to reduce the chance of that happening again.
But it’s difficult to influence systems that were developed without us. That’s why it’s important to learn from each other to influence policy and decision-makers to better consider our knowledge systems, and innovative ways to introduce our traditional management. It is difficult to re-introduce cultural burns which would dramatically minimize the risk of bushfires. Because the current management frameworks were developed without us, and our management practices in mind.
On the second day, I was able to walk on Country and hear from Uncle Lewis Burns about the process they went through to get some of their Tubba-Gah Country. There were many lessons I took from his stories, but it reaffirmed to me that negotiating is key for our mob. They compromised and negotiated to achieve something great for their community.
Walking on Tubba-Gah Country
Another great outcome from the week was networking. It’s often difficult to say you’ve got an Indigenous-led project when it starts with some prescriptive funding arrangement, but there were genuine Indigenous-led projects that came out of networking at the Gathering and I’m excited to see where they go.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders People already have the solutions to a lot of the climate challenges we are facing. From cultural burns to traditional practices, if we can influence systems and decision-makers, we can help this Country adapt to the changing climate.
Jade Gould
Butchulla leader and Climate Systems Hub Research Fellow
Learn more about Jade Gould’s work on K’gari.