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Indigenous sustainability practices and processes
A National Reconciliation Week event
David King, a Gundungurra Aboriginal elder, will share his insights on Australian Aboriginal Sustainability practices and processes, touching particularly on the prevalence of food wastage.
Our growing demand for food, the disregard for food wastage, and general environmental degradation is exhausting Country, laying it to waste. The food practices of First Australian peoples enabled them to sustain productivity, to nurture country, nurture their bodies, nurture their spirits and culture for 2500 generations (and counting). In the face of these growing challenges, there is a need to include First Nations people and their knowledges of food and Country.
What does it mean to care for Country? How can changes in food production address the historical injustices of colonialism? How can we address our current and future environmental challenges by including First Australian knowledge and experiences of how to care for Country?
For all time, Country has sustained the First Nations people of this continent. The foods of this continent have been nurtured, protected, harvested and prepared and the people, the animals, the fish and birds, the soils and the forests flourished.
Drawing on the insights of David King, Gundungurra Aboriginal elder and inspirational leader of the Bushcare Group community, this seminar will focus on First Australian sustainability practices and processes, and explore issues of food wastage, food justice and the ethical and environmental challenges of food security.
This event was held at the University of Sydney on Wednesday 30 May 2018.
Speakers
- Keynote Speaker
- David King is a Gundungurra Aboriginal elder, and member of The Gully Traditional Owners. David was Bushcare Legend of the Year in 2015.
- Chair
- Christine Winter, Sydney Environment Institute Phd Candidate from the Department of Government and International Relations.
- Respondents
- Cressida Rigney is a PhD Candidate at The University of Sydney, her interests lie in the developing native food industry, in particular the relationship between consumers (both commercial and domestic) and producers.
- Dr Margaret Raven is Postdoctoral Fellow through the Macquarie University Fellowship for Indigenous Researchers at Macquarie University. She previously worked as a Research Fellow at the Social Policy Research Centre (SPRC), University of New South Wales, Australia. Dr Raven is a geographer with experience working for a Native Title Representative Body, the Australian Human Rights Commission, and the WA Department of Aboriginal Affairs. Her research interests include Indigenous protocols in research and policy development; the spatial analysis of policies; Indigenous food security; and the role of Indigenous knowledge(s) in biodiversity conservation.
This event is co-presented with the Sydney Environment Institute in collaboration with the Food Wastage Fighters Society