Doing things better

The wind animates white flowers of Fringed Heath Myrtle, as a Hooded Robin darts past a 200-year-old Buloke tree in search of food. There's no traffic noise or hum from industrial machines. Only birdsong can be heard, and the rise and fall of relaxed conversation from underneath an old Yellow Box – a matriarch that bears many hollows.

Bellair Reserve, three hours’ drive north-west of Melbourne on Djandak (Dja Dja Wurrung Country), is alive with mostly intact heathy woodlands and hosts many Victorian endangered plants and animals, including the Lace Monitor and Red Cross Spider Orchid.

It is here that DJAARA (the Dja Dja Wurrung Clans Aboriginal Corporation) and Bush Heritage have come together to celebrate our partnership – Wurreka Galkangu – and launch the co-designed Wurreka Galkangu Shared Strategic Landscape Plan 2024–2034.

“We will continue to deliver, grow and learn together. I hope our plan is an example of working together, for the future and for the benefit of all.”

In Dja Dja Wurrung language, wurreka means ‘to yarn, to talk’, and galkangu means ‘to build together, make together, make things happen together, more connected to Country’. The Wurreka Galkangu partnership is about coming together to listen, learn, share knowledge and walk together in dhelkunya dja (healing Country).

Bush Heritage and DJAARA have been working together for over 17 years, and as relationships have developed, the partnership has matured, becoming a safe space to explore innovative ways of thinking about, engaging with and caring for Country.

For Bush Heritage, the Wurreka Galkangu partnership embodies a deeper approach to land management and acknowledges the vital role of Djaara (Dja Dja Wurrung people) in caring for Country.

In 2020, DJAARA and Bush Heritage began co-developing their Wurreka Galkangu Shared Strategic Landscape Plan – which will guide management of over 3,000 hectares of Bush Heritage reserves on Djandak.

To deliver the strongest outcomes for Country and people, the plan ensures Djaara voices are central in decision-making about Djandak, while utilising Western science to support culturally led land management. It has been brought to life through a co-design process of deep listening, learning and authentic sharing, including seven on-Country workshops between 2021 and 2023, multiple on-Country days, and the dedicated efforts of a regular project group.

Bam Lees, Bush Heritage Aboriginal Partnerships Manager, part of the Wurreka Galkangu project group, reflects on the plan’s development.

“We listened to what Djaara were telling us, simple as that!” Bam says. “It meant Djaara were fully informed and engaged in the process – in healing Country. We have the same aspirations and values, the journey has been flexible and not constricted or bound by organisational and historic ways.”

Bec Phillips, Chair of DJAARA Board, is among the group celebrating the plan’s launch at Bellair Reserve. “We haven’t always had access to Country, and over the years, we haven’t always seen it being looked after very well – and that’s not to say people haven’t had good intentions of doing that,” Bec says.

“I feel we were a missing part to the whole: us bringing forward countless generations of knowledge of this land. This concept of [the land] being alive, and us, a part of it – that’s really different in shaping how we work with it.”

Wurreka Galkangu honours the Dja Dja Wurrung worldview, recognising, firstly, that Djaara have cared for Country for millennia with sophisticated land management practices and, secondly, that the region’s more recent destructive colonial history has caused many parts of Djandak to become sick.

Through the partnership and plan, DJAARA and Bush Heritage set out to shift the power balance often found in Western land management and return decision-making power to Djaara – the Traditional Custodians.

Within the plan, Dja Dja Wurrung culture and traditional knowledge are foundational. Dhelkunya dja gunga (healing projects) for Country include managing cultural heritage, supporting Djaara to be on Country, cultural burning, and returning spirits through the return of culturally significant species. These are supported and complemented by Western science and conservation practices – bringing the strengths of both partners together.

Djaara man Amos Atkinson is also a member of the Wurreka Galkangu project group.

“With the future, we [Djaara] don’t have all the answers and Bush Heritage don’t have all the answers. But when we join together, we have a lot more answers than if one of us were to go it alone,” Amos says.

During the celebrations at Bellair Reserve, Rachel Lowry, Chief Executive Officer of Bush Heritage, highlights the importance of doing things better, together.

“Through this partnership and plan, we’re daring to challenge business as usual, and say we want to be better,” Rachel says.

“We will never stop learning from Djaara, and there’ll be times, as there have been in the past, where we won’t always get it right. But that’s the test of true partnership: when we stumble, and when we stumble together, we lift one another up.”

At times throughout the partnership, finding a shared pathway for two worldviews has been challenging, but, ultimately, the experience has been extremely rewarding. The plan – like the partnership – is about long-term commitment. Bam describes it as intergenerational.

“We will continue to deliver, grow and learn together. I hope our plan is an example of working together, for the future and for the benefit of all,” she says.

Amos agrees, “Ten years from now, I’ll hopefully retire. But my kids can then take up the torch, and my great- great-grandson can take up that torch and follow on from the work we’ve done.”

The lead up to 2030 and beyond raises big questions for humanity but also creates space for ingenuity and innovation. We believe the path we’re walking with DJAARA represents strong steps in the right direction.

We thank and gratefully acknowledge DJAARA for their partnership and the Helen Macpherson Smith Trust for their generous support of Wurreka Galkangu.