@article {bnh-8015, title = {Developing effective emergency management partnerships in remote north Australian communities - final project report}, number = {670}, year = {2021}, month = {05/2021}, 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 typically insubstantial relationships emergency management agencies have with traditional Aboriginal landowners and their wider communities. Preparation and response to the two cyclones, Lam (Feb. 19-20) and Nathan (March 22), that struck east and central Arnhem Land in 2015 are a case in point, prompting practical research into how we can strengthen existing governance arrangements in remote areas to promote and enrich such relationships. This project extends a suite of projects hosted by Charles Darwin University under the Northern Hub of the Bushfires and Natural Hazards Cooperative Research Centre, collectively addressing {\textquoteleft}building capacity in north Australian remote communities.

Under the collective theme of developing effective emergency management partnerships, the project focused on two of the several communities in Arnhem Land struck by cyclones Lam and Nathan {\textendash} Galiwin{\textquoteright}ku and Ramingining.\  Indigenous leadership in these communities were again struck by underlying issues effecting cultural authority, including poor consideration of community members as core players holding significant knowledge and other assets valuable to hazard preparation, response and community reconstruction. Whilst Galiwin{\textquoteright}ku residents, for example, greatly appreciated the effective response delivered by EM agencies, the events and their aftermath also brought to the surface issues of lost cultural authority, disempowerment, and disengagement within the community. They keenly sought support for practical local efforts to better understand and address the trend of marginalization and dependence on external agency management. Similarly, in Ramingining, the elders felt a sense of powerlessness and shame to be onlookers for response efforts that they wished to be active participants of.

NAILSMA (Indigenous research and service provider, co-partner in the Northern Hub of the CRC and project manager) was in a position to offer administrative, logistical, mentoring and other support to Galiwin{\textquoteright}ku{\textquoteright}s leadership. Yalu Maringithinyaraw is a local Yolngu organisation with research interests and capability that was the local host for the work.

ARPNet, an Indigenous research network of community based Aboriginal Research practitioners is hosted by RIEL at CDU. ARPNet researchers have worked together and developed an approach that emphasises putting the community first and have also adapted a set of PAR tools (the ARPNet Dilly bag) that they use. The Network trains, mentors and provides administrative support to a growing network of community-based Indigenous researchers, dedicated to relocating local research effort in local hands and improving the operation and outcomes of research for local communities and those that service them.\ \ \ \  \ 

It{\textquoteright}s well recognised that strong similarities exist amongst communities across the NT and indeed the North, but that each place is unique. In this context, the projects at Galiwin{\textquoteright}ku and Ramingining developed relatively independently but highlighted in their collective outcomes important messages for EM agency and others about navigating continuity and difference across Indigenous geographies in their policy making and operations.

It was broadly concluded that government and other agencies need to change the way they do business with Yolngu/Bininj by helping empower traditional owners and clan leaders and improve community engagement to produce more effective service delivery.

Concomitantly, NAILSMA, ARPNet and CDU sought to engage EM leadership across the North and in the BNHCRC community with the research developments as they unfolded in Galiwin{\textquoteright}ku and Ramingining, and to inform the local researchers of the perspectives and logic driving EM organization in relevant jurisdictions. This parallel effort strengthened the strategic need to come together {\textquoteleft}at the table{\textquoteright} to work through practical, fundamental change in the way agencies and communities do business {\textendash} a process anticipated as ongoing.

Recognising the resource-intensive nature of the work, connections were made with related projects to provide mutual support for project activities and partnerships.\  The overall objective of the project was to inform effective EM agency community partnership arrangements in remote communities based on enhanced understanding and empowerment of underlying community governance structures. Lessons learnt from the undertaking of this project were used to develop a {\textquoteleft}protocols framework{\textquoteright} to help inform the development of effective agency-community EM partnerships in remote community locations across northern Australia.

This research has identified a common set of core governance issues (see Findings below) and priorities needing to be acknowledged and addressed to improve implementation of emergency risk management arrangements in remote communities. This work has helped these remote communities, and hopefully others, find voice to more effectively engage in the emergency management conversation, and in partnership building at local and national levels. It has also shown that most agencies involved are open to, if not keenly interested in greater equity with communities in engagement but are uncertain and/or systemically blind to how they may initiate and progress real and effective change in remote EM. There is strong interest from the participating communities to continue their work and engage with other end-users in for example, enhanced local and regional-scale planning; the dissemination of quality, relevant and timely information; building partnership support for community level risk mitigation, disaster management and response. These projects provide a conceptual model and approach for scaling up the project of partnership building to other communities in the NT, WA and Qld, and a basis for understanding the costs and benefits involved in broadscale implementation. Project partners are seeking to progress current projects and offer their experience, skills, tools and relationships developed in these two community endeavors to other community groups seeking to improve the way they, EM and other agencies work together. Project partners believe this to be a good foundation for a regional and national framework approach for EM agency/community engagement and relationship building.

}, keywords = {communities, effective, Emergency management, north australia, partnerships, remote}, issn = {670}, author = {Sithole, B and Otto Bulmaniya Campion and Glenn James and Danny Burton and Maratja Dhamarrandji and Hmalan Hunter-Xenie} } @article {bnh-7810, title = {North Australian bushfire and natural hazard training - final project report}, number = {644}, year = {2021}, month = {01/2021}, institution = {Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC}, address = {Melbourne}, abstract = {

This report provides an overview, including the north Australian bushfire and natural hazard ({\textquoteleft}BNH{\textquoteright}) context and the social background for the North Australian Bushfire and Natural Hazard Training project.

The project has proceeded slowly (five years) and has changed dramatically as a result of engaging in Participatory Action Research ({\textquoteleft}PAR{\textquoteright}). This approach to researching the training needs of residents of remote north Australian communities encouraged these residents to participate in the framing of the enquiry as well as the generation of answers and training materials.

Several desktop reviews were undertaken during the project. These examined the existing BNH training offerings as well as the opportunities that existed at the time for Indigenous community members to obtain leadership training. The reviews found that where training existed it largely omitted Indigenous perspectives, particularly in terms of strategic overviews and planning. For leadership training, it was found that where remote communities were able to access training for BNH it did not focus on leadership and that which focused on leadership did not include BNH management.

In response to the views of project participants and the reviews, the project developed a set of training units that, taken together, drew together the essential elements of Indigenous and non-Indigenous BNH training in a Vocational Education and Training ({\textquoteleft}VET{\textquoteright}) style program. The program does however modify the {\textquoteleft}standard{\textquoteright} VET approach through the provision of flexible temporal arrangements for training and assessing. This need was identified as the project recognized the requirement to train {\textquoteleft}on Country [1]{\textquoteright} and to use local knowledge-holders in the preparations for and delivery of the training.

Nine formal {\textquoteleft}engagements{\textquoteright} were held over the life of the project, including workshops and three training pilots. In each pilot, different components of the ten training units were presented and refined. A detailed and culturally appropriate evaluation was undertaken of each pilot and the feedback was incorporated into the next {\textquoteleft}round{\textquoteright} of pilot training.

10 training units have been developed by the project. Some of these are entirely new while others are adaptations of existing training, albeit adapted sufficient to warrant a new unit descriptor.

The 10 units have not yet been subject to National Accreditation, but are designed to map onto the Standards for VET Accredited Courses as set out by the Australian Skills Quality Authority. Each unit has been framed in terms of {\textquoteleft}Elements and Performance Criteria{\textquoteright}, {\textquoteleft}Evidence Guide{\textquoteright}, {\textquoteleft}Requiired Skills and Knowledge{\textquoteright} and a {\textquoteleft}Range Statement{\textquoteright}.


[1] The capitalised term {\textquoteleft}Country{\textquoteright} is used throughout to indicate the entity which extends well beyond the English term for {\textquoteleft}nation{\textquoteright} or {\textquoteleft}landscape{\textquoteright} or {\textquoteleft}rural{\textquoteright}. For the Indigenous people who participated in this project {\textquoteleft}Country{\textquoteright} refers an entity which transcends physical, moral, spiritual and metaphysical realms and of which they are an integral part. Country is at all times the ground on which one stands but also inside a person (cf. Holmes \& Janpajimpa 2013: 18). It is something one can be taken off, but can never be removed from within.

}, keywords = {Bushfire, natural hazard, north australia, training}, issn = {644}, author = {Sutton, S} } @article {bnh-8037, title = {Building capacity in north Australian remote communities - utilisation project report}, number = {672}, year = {2020}, month = {11/2020}, institution = {Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC}, address = {MELBOURNE}, abstract = {

The utilisation workshop was built on preliminary discussions between the research team and agency end users, the Red Cross, community stakeholders and research partners regarding the development of better communication between remote Indigenous communities and fire and emergency services agencies, to reduce risk and build resilience by taking advantage of local knowledge and skills. The workshop addressed topics relating to volunteer models, and specifically the inapplicability, of the classical model, to people living in remote Indigenous communities.

Outputs of the workshop will shape the form of utilisation product/s that participants considered useful for addressing their specific and collective needs regarding volunteering.

This report is a summary of the workshop in Darwin, 11-12th November 2020, and provides summary documents addressing volunteer models adopting narrative formats (e.g. case studies, storytelling, etc); refers to videos addressing key issues for wider community distribution.

The CRC and CDU and our partners will work on the development and delivery of a second utilisation phase 2021. The in-kind support for this workshop, from supporting agencies and stakeholders, will ensure appropriate development of utilisation products during the second phase. This utilisation workshop was funded by the Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC in direction linkage to the Building Remote Community Resilience to Natural Hazards Core Research project.

}, keywords = {building, capacity, communities, north australia, remote, utilisation, workshops}, issn = {672}, author = {Jeremy Russell-Smith and Kamaljit Sangha and Andrew C. Edwards} }