Category: Other

Central Western Desert IPA

Anangu traditional owners are gathering at Ilpili, a significant water site between Walungurru (Kintore) and Papunya, to celebrate the new Central Western Desert Indigenous Protected Area on Wednesday, 12 March.

The IPA covers the Haasts Bluff Aboriginal Land Trust, some almost 40,000 square kilometres, and comes with additional resources allowing traditional owners and Central Land Council rangers to better care for country.

The IPA is the missing piece of the puzzle between the CLC-managed Southern Tanami, Northern Tanami, Angas Downs and Katiti Peterman IPAs, adding to a network of conservation areas larger than Victoria.

It forms part of a 435,000 square kilometre cross-border protected desert area that also includes neighbouring Uluru-Kata Tjuta and Watarrka national parks.

The IPA features rich cultural landscapes that are home to rare and endangered native plants and animals.

Over the past two decades, nine threatened species have been found here, including the critically endangered central rock rat that survives in the ranges around Papunya.

 “The Central Western Desert IPA is not just about conservation­,” CLC chief executive Les Turner said.

“It is also about empowering traditional owners to drive the development of the region by creating good jobs on country.”

The IPA’s traditional owners are looking forward to protecting it against feral camels, buffel grass, wildfires and other threats with the help of federal government funding.

The CLC’s Anangu Luritjiku and Walungurru ranger groups will manage this land under the guidance of the traditional owners, following a detailed IPA management plan.

“This IPA gives us our own voice and brings all the communities together in managing our land,” Anangu Luritjiku ranger group coordinator Lynda Lechleitner said. 

“It’s also going to make it faster to deliver our work on the ground because we are all working towards the same plan.”

The rangers of tomorrow will be front and centre of the community celebration at Ilpili, 400 kilometres west of Alice Springs.

Children from schools across the land trust will join the adults for purlapa (ceremonial dancing), billy can races, spear throwing, sand painting, water testing and animal tracking.

The Australian Government’s $231.5 million IPA program supports this project.

IPAs are established under agreements between First Nations peoples and the Australian Government to manage and protect areas of land and sea for biodiversity conservation.

They make up more than 13 per cent of Australia’s landmass and more than half of the national reserve system.

The government has set a target to protect and conserve 30 per cent of Australia’s land and oceans by 2030.

The Central Western Desert IPA adds nearly four million hectares to help reach this target – more than 24 per cent of Australia’s landmass is now protected.

Download media release PDF

IPA fact sheet PDF

MEDIA CONTACT: Sophia Willcocks | 0488 984 885 | sophia.willcocks@clc.org.au

Your guide to being a council member

Aboriginal Peak Organisations of the Northern Territory (APO NT) stand with the family and Yuendumu community following the outcome of the murder trial for the fatal shooting by a police officer of Warlpiri teenager Kumanjayi Walker.

The outcome in this tragic ordeal brings heartbreak and pain for the family, a grief that is shared by all Aboriginal people. The family and Yuendumu community have shown respect for the court process, demonstrating again how our people remain strong and resilient in the face of racism, police brutality and trauma.

Aboriginal people must be supported to feel safe in their homes and their communities. We at APO NT recognise that this is not the end of the story. Police need to work respectfully, in partnership with Aboriginal community leaders and organisations, to prevent harms and keep people safe and protected. Hopefully this will be the last time that we see these kind of traumatizing policing tactics played out anywhere across this country.

Warlpiri and the Yuendumu community must now lead the healing journey, and we support their calls for accountability and justice. To rebuild trust, police must bring an end to guns and the use of excessive force in our communities. There needs to be an independent Board of Inquiry to restore community confidence in police and to examine police culture allowing racism to still exist. The Inquiry must also examine a return to community policing and protocols that demonstrate respect for our people.

APO NT’s sincere condolences are extended to the family of Kumanjayi Walker and the Warlpiri Nation.

We stand with Yuendumu. It’s time for real justice and respect for our people!

You can only enter and leave the biosecurity zones (the Barkly, Central Desert and MacDonnell regional council areas) with a negative rapid antigen test (RAT) and a permission letter from the CLC.

If you are in Alice Springs you will also need a negative RAT and a permission letter before you will be allowed to go home.

First go to 44 Bath Street (corner Bath Street and Gregory Terrace) to take a RAT test.

Then take your negative test result and you ID to our AAMC office in 71 Bath Street to apply for a permission letter.

Please come to the entrance on the back lane, off Stott Terrace.

The office will be open from Monday, and every weekday between 8:30 and 17:00.

If you test positive and you or your close contacts can’t go home please call the following emergency relief services:

  • Ngaanyatjarra Pitjantjatjara Yankunytjatjara Women’s Council – 8958 2345
  • Tangentyere Council – 8951 4222
  • The Salvation Army – 13 72 58
  • Waltja Tjutangku Palyapayi – 8953 4488
  • Alice Springs Women’s Shelter – 8952 6075

If you want to leave the Barkly regional council area please contact the CLC office in Tennant Creek on 8951 0540.

Our staff there will also need to see your negative RAT result and your ID.

You can also call us on 8951 0600 during business hours.

Government rule change unfairly advantages horticulture company


The Central Land Council says the NT Government must scrap the Singleton Station water licence decision following revelations by the ABC that the government may have bent the rules to give Fortune Agribusiness an unfair advantage over Aboriginal landowners and the public.


“Documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act reveal that one of the government’s own water planners warned against creating the impression that the government gave the company an unfair procedural advantage over the rights and interests of traditional owners, native title holders and remote community residents,” said CLC chief executive Les Turner.


“These documents show that the NT Environment Department chief executive Jo Townsend (who also happens to be the NT water controller) was alerted to the risk of the perception that her department is either incompetent or something more sinister is going on, but ignored the warning.”


“They demonstrate that the government puts private profits before the rights and interests of our people and treats sacred site protection with total contempt.”


The documents show that following a 2019 meeting between Ms Townsend, Fortune Agribusiness, chief minister Michael Gunner and water security minister Eva Lawler, Ms Townsend directed her department to quickly fix the issue of groundwater-dependent ecosystems, so that it would be clear that not all of these ecosystems needed to be protected.
The department then developed a guideline in consultation with the company which Ms Townsend approved.


It applies exclusively to the water region that includes by Singleton Station and allows for the destruction of up to 30 per cent of ground-water-dependent ecosystems, which were previously protected.
In 2020, this time acting as the water controller, she referred to the guideline in her decision to award the NT’s biggest-ever water licence to the company, allowing it to pump up 40,000 mega litres of finite groundwater per year for 30 years, for free and largely to grow export crops.


“Unsurprisingly, the company’s modelling showed that the impact of the licence on groundwater-dependent ecosystems would be within the 30 per cent allowed by the guideline,” Mr Turner said.


“As representatives of the traditional owners the CLC took part in water planning for the region around Singleton in good faith and made sure the water allocation plan stated that Aboriginal cultural values must be protected,” Mr Turner said.


“The department needs to explain why, without consulting with us, it tailored a guideline for the benefit of Fortune Agribusiness that flies in the face of that plan and allows the company to destroy the very ecosystems that are home to dozens of sacred sites.”


The water controller granted the licence before a thorough assessment of the environmental impacts of the proposal on culturally important groundwater-dependent ecosystems.


“She ignored the views of the traditional owners and failed to consider the impact of the water licence on their sites. She didn’t even include any conditions for sacred site protection in the licence,” he said.


“If Minister Lawler is a fair and independent umpire in the current review of the licence she would listen to the traditional owners and scrap it rather than roll over for private business.”