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The Community of Kakadu
Dillon Cromie Yr9
Introduction
Kakadu National Park is the largest national park in Australia, located in the Northern Territory, Australia (coordinates 12°25'16"S, 132°40'23"E). It is 171km South East of Darwin and is 19,804km2. Kakadu was named after the mispronunciation of Gaagudju- a aboriginal language formally spoken on the northern side of the national park. Established around 1978, Kakadu was founded during a time when the Australian community was becoming more and more interested in the conservation of Australia and wanted to declare several areas as national parks. It's one of four Australian sites listed on the World Heritage List under both the natural and cultural category
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is home to many different attractions and famous icons, from the Aboriginal Rock Paintings at the sacred Ubirr, the mesmerising Nourlangie Rock to the Ranger Uranium mine. Attracting thousands of tourists a year, Kakadu is certainly a national treasure. Kakadu's Identity Kakadu's connection to the country and Indigenous culture represents their identity.
They take care of the national park and their sacred areas immensely. Their sacred rock paintings record thousands of years of Aboriginal culture show how they truly come together as a community. This really shows how they have managed to keep their culture alive and the reason why Kakadu has the oldest living culture on earth, dating back to 50,000 years ago.
Due to the colonisation of Australia and immigrants arriving in Australia, countless of Indigenous languages, practices, cultures and communities were lost. However, the Indigenous communities of Kakadu are still alive today, which is shown by how well they take care of the land, their people and art. Unlike the non-indigenous people, who will see a rock or a building, the Indigenous will see something spiritual and sacred. Before non-indigenous settlement, 12 Aboriginal languages were spoken in Kakadu but now there is only 3 spoken:- Gun-djeihmi, Kun-winjku and
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Jawoyn. The Aborigines who live in the north of Kakadu are called Bininj and Mungguy in the south. In Kakadu there are 19 clans. A clan is two or more family groups who own a specific part of the land and is passed down by the father. Each clan has a spiritual connection to the country, and caring for the land is their main priority, for the Indigenous believe that Kakadu was shaped by their spiritual ancestors and taught them how to care for the land. Changes in the Community Nature With Kakadu being on the World Heritage List, it is vital that it is maintained and well looked after. Hazards such as pests, fires, disease and infestation are constantly threatening Kakadu's beautiful landscape and wildlife. Fortunately, Kakadu is one of Australia's most weed-free conservation areas, and only a small number of weeds are hard to control and spread easily. Animals such as cane toads, buffaloes, pigs and dogs affect not only the flora of the national park, but other animals as well. For example, wild dogs have started breeding with dingoes, which is affecting the dingo gene pool. If this continues, the dingo population in Kakadu will be in serious danger. Luckily, all the dogs in towns such as Jabiru are registered, which will hopefully decrease this problem. Tourism Kakadu is one of Australia's most wanted places to visit, attracting more than 200,000 tourists every year. Although the tourism is great for the park for it spreads awareness of conserving the park, having so many people visit the sacred sights such as Ubirr could damage the sites, especially if people are constantly touching the paintings they will fade away. Luckily, sites like Ubirr have a strict no-touching policy and have barriers surrounding each painting. Education In December 2014, Jabiru Childcare received $3000 from the ERA community to purchase outdoor resources which was used to meet the regulations on educational development.
The West Arnhem Regional Council has also invested in objectives such as having free wifi throughout the whole of Jabiru and to upgrade the technology such as computers to help the education of the communities' youth.
Investments with a positive outcome
There have been some outstanding investments the councils have provided for the people of Kakadu to help them in the future. In 2015, the Jabiru Town Development Authority invested $1.65 million into upgrades for the clean water supply, sewerage and electricity network. Jabiru also won the Australian Tidy Towns Resource Recovery Award for the Northern Territory, with their residential kerbside collection, a voluntary drop-off recycling system, and extensive sorting at a land-fill site. Even just little steps like these can make huge changes in the near future for Kakadu.
Groups Involved In The Changes
List of groups and communities:
WARC (West Arnhem Regional
Council) The West Arnhem Regional Council is a local government situated in the Northern Territory that looks after, develops and maintains Kakadu National Park. WARC recently introduced their full time IT professional Greg Ward, who has helped start major IT projects in Kakadu such as replacing and upgrading old desktops and printers. EARC (East Arnhem Regional Council) Like the West Arnhem Regional Council, the East Arnhem Regional Council is also a local government situated in the Northern Territory that also looks after, develops and maintains Kakadu National Park. EARC has made terrific developments lately, such as realising an app called Whispir, a free messaging service that allows EARC to communicate with the residents of Kakadu and keep them up to date with the latest news and events that are happening in the area. Gundjeihmi Aboriginal Corporation "The Gundjeihmi Aboriginal Corporation (GAC) is the representative body of the Mirarr Aboriginal people of Australia’s Northern Territory. It represents the Mirarr's rights and responsibilities and advocates on behalf of the community across a wide range of fields and activities, including cultural heritage, politics, law, economic development, the natural and social sciences, and education, training and employment." -GAC homepage. Jabiru Town Development Authority The Jabiru Town Development Authority is an organisation that was established in 1978 to develop, maintain and control the town of Jabiru. To help develop Jabiru, they invested $1.65 million into upgrades for the clean water supply, sewerage and electricity network in 2015. By them doing this, there have been immense changes in Jabiru that have helped Jabiru succeed in developing. The Communities' Response To Changes All the changes above seem to have a positive effect on the community and seems to be no complaints. However, one recent change in the community has sparked major controversy. The Ranger Uranium Mine is in Kakadu National Park and commenced operation in 1980. The Indigenous people living in the area (who hadn't had much intrusion from "white" culture) reluctantly allowed the government to start mining on their sacred lands. The uranium that is mined there is sold internationally which benefits Australia's economy immensely. The mining has become a controversial topic due to the mass publicity regarding the potential danger of nuclear power and uranium mining, not to mention the objections by some Indigenous groups. The controversy is significant because it involves a number of important political issues in Australia such as our Native Title, the environment, and Federal-State-Territory relationships. Also, there were numerous incidents that were reported at the Ranger Uranium Mine that made people worried for the workers there and the danger that is there. There were at least 150 spills and leaks of dangerous chemicals and several licence breaches. The area could become radioactive for hundreds of year, which would impact the Indigenous people because it was their sacred ancestral land. There were benefits of the mining however. Australia possesses 24% of the whole world's uranium, which made the economy of Australia boom, uranium oxide brought $2.1 billion to the economy and provided jobs for the unemployed. However, the cons definitely outweigh the pros, so the mine is facing closure.
There are various Aboriginal tribes throughout Australia. The Yolngu, a north eastern Australian Aboriginal tribe, will be the the primary focus of this paper as they are also the primary
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Bourke, E and Edwards, B. 1994. Aboriginal Australia. St Lucia, Queensland: University of Queensland Press.
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