@article {bnh-7786, title = {Developing effective emergency management partnerships in remote north Australian communities - annual report 2019-2020}, number = {637}, year = {2021}, month = {01/2021}, institution = {Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC}, address = {Melbourne}, abstract = {

Natural hazards in the remote Northern Territory such as cyclones have arguably been managed as best as possible given the typical relationships emergency management agencies have with traditional Aboriginal landowners and their wider communities. Preparation and response to the two cyclones, Nathan and Lam, that struck east and central Arnhem Land in 2015 are a case in point. This report refers to 2 projects, conducted using NAILSMA support with Yolngu in Galiwinku and ARPNet with Bininj in Ramingining.

Most Yolngu interviewed at Galiwin{\textquoteright}ku (which was hit directly) after the cyclones comented that the emergency teams did a good job restoring services and rendering the community safe and habitable in the aftermath and that the response was fairly swift and efficient. The research undertaken by Yolngu in the months after Nathan and Lam was keenly sought because of underlying issues effecting Yolngu authority in their own community, including poor consideration of community members as core players and as assets to preparation, response and reconstruction.

The Yolngu research focused on the cyclone scenario but quickly developed into a frank discussion amongst Yolngu in the community about the status of Yolngu leadership, authority and decision-making and the processes they felt are eroding Yolngu values and community wellbeing. Whilst the influences on Yolngu management of their community are highly complex (cultural, economic and historical) the research confirmed a core of issues around colonial agency virtually unanimously expressed by all respondents. Despite natural right and legal land tenure (Aboriginal land held in fee simple under the ALR(NT) Act 1976)0F\ [1] government and NGO services and activities in Galiwin{\textquoteright}ku are increasdingly undertaken with external mandate only and prosecuted by non-Yolngu agents in English (still a subornitate language locally to the Yolngu lingua franca), guided by external agendas and success criteria1F\ [2].\ \ \ \ 

Community leaders concluded that they needed to reinstate Yolngu authority based in Yolngu law to provide a forum through which emergency management and other agencies can offer and deliver services more effectively. Whilst not a new idea, the structure they settled on (named the Dalkarra and Djirrikay Authority - DDA) developed without hosting or direction from non-Yolngu organisations. The CRC northern hub projects enabled NAILSMA to provide basic financial, logistical and administrative support, as requested by community leaders, playing a crucial role in buttressing culturally appropriate Yolngu-controlled participatory research and resilience building activities since the 2015 cyclones.

The DDA has been a forum in which community tensions have been sensitively managed in order to engage effectively with service providers including emergency management agencies. The DDA has many challenges (internal and external) but has recently engaged with a CRC supported {\textquoteleft}sister{\textquoteright} initiative at Ramingining to share experiences and discuss views on ways forward. Despite operating independently, the Galiwin{\textquoteright}ku and Ramingining groups identified common concerns, and expressed an interest in obtaining mutual support and developing an agreed approach to anticipated face to face communication with the NT Comissioner for Police Jamie Chalker.\ \ 

For Ramingining, the focus was placed on why communities felt the response to Cyclones Lam and Nathan had not worked as well as they would have wanted. \ The community owned research at Ramingining was undertaken by the Aboriginal Research Practitioners Network (ARPNet). ARPNet considered how the Bininj system can link up with the Balanda decision making system in a way that would improve on-ground engagement and developed a comprehensive list of protocols (see Utilisation and impact section).

Yolngu and Bininj experiences post cyclones Nathan and Lam challenge the current models for disaster response which focus on volunteer assistance.\  Yolngu/Bininj have a great deal to offer hazard assessment, preparation and response. Equitable and authoritative involvement for Yolngu/Bininj in all aspects of EM management is the only way to maximize positive EM outcomes. Local knowledge, skills and assets could be properly investigated, supported and developed to involve Yolngu/Bininj in producing more effective EM outcomes.\  This is demonstrated, for example, in environmental services by paid ranger groups undertaking complex land and sea management activities.

NAILSMA, ARPNet and CDU have also been working in parallel across other jurisdictions of northern Australia, and in government spheres in the NT, to understand and help progress more equitable and functional relationships in the emergency management space. This {\textquoteleft}global{\textquoteright} part of the project story is of significant interest to the Galiwin{\textquoteright}ku and Ramingining groups who seek the opportunity for the NT Partnership projects to engage directly with emergency management leadership. It has also given them a sense of common interest and comradery with countrymen interstate and raised an awareness for future possibilities in their own endeavours.

This BNHCRC research project is near complete, but for Indigenous leaders of Galiwin{\textquoteright}ku and Ramingining this important effort over the last few years has created a foundation for real change. They are at the beginning and with some clarity now about what needs to be done. \ Their research has identified key issues impeding efficiency in emergency management and response and the delivery of more desirable outcomes for remote Indigenous communities. In order to progress the dialogue created by this research toward more practical and tangible end use outcomes, the {\textquoteleft}next steps{\textquoteright} of a broader project need to be realised.


[1]\  The Aboriginal Land Rights (Northern Territory) Act, 1976 is Federal Government legislation granting communal freehold title to traditional Aboriginal land-owners in the form of Land Trusts (managed by the relevant NT Land Councils created under that legislation) in the Northern Territory only. Aboriginal Land Trusts are inalienable freehold.

[2] Whilst Yolngu acknowledge the need for many of the services provided it{\textquoteright}s the manner in which they are designed and provided that they feel disempowers them and at times contradicts the services and embeds bad protocol {\textendash} for example, complex community emergency response plans in English, kept at the police station; de-funding homelands; priveliging English over the natural language in schools; arbitrary and disconnected creation of Yolngu steering committees or reference groups to support government agency work; or the formation of a community committees such as to discuss COVID 19 issues and responses, a{\textquoteright}priori made up of non-Yolngu community agents. . . Whether constituted in the ways thus described, the strong perception by and effect on Yolngu is of deliberate dis-enfranchisement in their own community.

}, keywords = {communities, emergency management partnerships, remote north Australia}, issn = {637}, author = {Glenn James and Sithole, B and Danny Burton and Jeremy Russell-Smith} }