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Alinytjara Wilurara - Natural Resource Management region

Regional summary

The Alinytjara Wilurara region covers 107,000 square kilometres, or approximately 10 percent of South Australia. It has a population of around 4000. The region comprises the vast area of the northwest of the state from the Northern Territory and West Australian borders to the Great Australian Bight, and includes the Nullarbor Plain, Anangu Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara Lands, Maralinga Tjarutjara Lands, Yalata and some large national parks in the region.

The regional body, the Alinytjara Wilurara Integrated Natural Resource Management (NRM) Group, also has a role in supporting a wide range of Alinytjara Wilurara Trust properties, owned or leased by Aboriginal people, and areas where Aboriginal people have a formal involvement in management or co-management throughout the state.

Priority issues

Key natural resource management issues in the region include:

• building community capacity to live on and manage the lands
• minimising total grazing pressure through feral animal control and stock management
• controlling weeds
• identifying and developing sustainable natural resource industries or enterprises
• identifying and sustaining healthy water supplies for community use and for water-dependent ecosystems
• controlling soil erosion
• protecting and managing priority areas for biodiversity
• maintaining and protecting social and cultural values

Regional plan

The Alinytjara Wilurara Integrated NRM Regional Groupwas responsible for developing the Alinytjara Wilurara regional plan, in consultation with the local community. This plan was based on a whole-of-region approach and addresses significant NRM issues incorporating social, environmental and economic aspects.

The Alinytjara Wilurara Integrated NRM Regional Group was also responsible for developing and implementing the regional investment strategy, which is essentially the business plan that attracts investment from the Australian and state governments and details the specific actions, costs and timeframes required to implement the regional plan.

The Lands of the Alinytjara Wilurara Integrated NRM region contains many intact cultural sites and some of the most diverse ecosystems in Australia. Many are under threat of degradation from impacts associated with weeds and pests, visitor impacts and developments which could result in the loss of culture and many threatened species and the habitats that support them.

The region supports a broad range of people, groups and organisations with vital roles in sustainable NRM. These include Indigenous land managers, voluntary groups, Aboriginal community councils, research and development groups, industry groups and statutory and non-statutory bodies.

• Alinytjara Wilurara plan - accredited June 2004

Current activities

NRM priority	Activities addressing the priority
Land management planning	completion of strategies to control problems such as feral animals and weeds completion of a fire management strategy developing a water-point and wetland protection strategy incorporating feral animal control and stock management developing an initial water management strategy to support the efficient and sustainable use of surface and ground water resources developing a dust mitigation programme for at risk towns, settlements and homelands developing a strategy to manage visitors to the region, especially access to coastal areas, and impacts on cultural sites identifying, recording, monitoring and protecting sites of particular cultural significance developing local area management plans with focus on protecting or restoring plants and animals of particular importance to Indigenous Australians
Supporting integrated on-ground works	rock-hole cleaning and patch burning dust mitigation, including revegetation with local native vegetation, in and around at-risk communities feral animal and weed control in priority areas including habitat for threatened species such as the Yellow Footed Rock Wallaby effectively managing water resources including throughmaintaining infrastructure, such as wastewater treatment systems to avoid pollution of surface and ground waters controlling unwanted vehicle access and protecting and rehabilitating affected areas implementing programmes to protect and restore areas and items of particular cultural significance training programmes to support ongoing employment of Indigenous Australians in natural resource management programmes to raise awareness about natural resource issues, particularly weeds, ferals and water
Prevention of new problems and the support of regional monitoring programmes	reviewing measures to prevent new incursions of feral animals and diseases reviewing arrangements for risk assessment by planning authorities when dealing with development applications that could affect cultural sites assessment of water quality, groundwater levels and surface water flows, soil erosion and native vegetation cover, threatened species and feral animals and weeds

Contacts

Further information can be obtained by contacting the Regional Facilitators for South Australia.