Dr Bevlyne Sithole

Through extensive consultations undertaken with regional emergency management agencies and Indigenous community partners across northern Australia, this project has established that an ongoing priority is to support the building of more effective emergency management agency-community partnership arrangements in remote communities, based on empowerment of and better engagement with community governance structures. This project explored community governance issues and aspirations among Yolngu and Bininj (Aboriginal people from east Arnhem Land and central and west Arnhem Land respectively) in two major communities: Galiwin’ku and Ramingining. In recognising persistent and systemic marginalisation issues, such as poor communication and engagement, project leaders sought to provide a stronger foundation for partnerships at a community level and a clear direction to emergency management and other agencies to adopt for more effective and mutually beneficial partnership arrangements in service delivery.