Indigenous land Corporation (ILC) owned property, Murrayfield Station on North Bruny Island, Tasmania, is today hosting a course that will pave the way for improved cultural heritage protection throughout Tasmania.
The natural resource manager’s course addresses the challenges involved in appropriately managing Indigenous cultural heritage and biodiversity in the context of primary production and other land uses.
The course, “Considering Indigenous Issues in Natural Resource Management”, will canvass physical heritage, contemporary cultural issues, legislation and community consultation issues involved in land management activities.
ILC Chairperson, Shirley McPherson says, “The ILC is delighted to be able to host the course. Murrayfield is a very special place and an ideal location. It has a unique blend of rich Aboriginal history and stunning patches of bushland, while operating as a sheep station. I thank the Natural Heritage Trust for their funding of the course.”
Murrayfield Station is highly culturally and historically significant to Indigenous Tasmanians. The famous Truganini was born on Bruny Island and a section of Murrayfield is believed to be the site of the first established mission in Tasmania by George Augustus Robinson. Numerous Indigenous cultural areas exist across the property.
Biodiversity highlights include five vegetation communities of conservation significance providing important habitat to endangered bird species, such as the forty-spotted pardalote and the swift parrot as well as vulnerable species such as the white-bellied sea eagle and eastern barred bandicoot. Murrayfield is also the site of southern Tasmania’s largest population of grass trees, now threatened by fungal disease.
The ILC owns and operates the property as a sheep station and is very keen to support activities that will benefit Indigenous people culturally socially, environmentally and economically.
Participants in the course will benefit from greater understanding of the property’s cultural and environmental values provided by ILC commissioned cultural and native vegetation management plans finalised in January 2005. These identify the cultural and environmental features of the property and recommend practical on-ground actions required to preserve and enhance them.
ENDS
Contact: Peter Keough (08) 8100 7106; 0409 090 852