Overview
Understanding native title economies: tracking community time and work
The number of native title corporations, commonly referred to as Prescribed Bodies Corporate (PBCs), is growing every year. There are currently 145 spread across Australia.
Most of these native title corporations have little or no income or assets to carry out their native title rights. Many rely heavily on volunteer work by their directors and members just to meet their statuary obligations, let alone being able to further community development.
We often hear about how much time and money is put into native title; however, we do not hear the other side of the story: how much time and money community members are putting into native title themselves.
This project seeks to track the time, costs and benefits of the native title claims process and running a native title corporation for native title holders. We are developing the �Work Tracker’ database in partnership with three different communities, which will become a stand-alone product for native title corporations to use themselves to track the amount and type of work they are doing.
The project will also produce:
- Community reports
- Discussion paper
- Collaborative conference presentations
A pilot study, the Nyangumarta Corporate History Research Project, was completed by Dr. Pamela McGrath in 2014 with our first partner: Nyangumarta Warrarn RNTBC and Yamatji Marlpa Aboriginal Corporation (YMAC), Western Australia.
To continue the work from this study AIATSIS, led by Dr. Belinda Burbidge, formed a second partnership in January 2016 with Eastern Maar Aboriginal Corporation and Native Title Services Victoria.
We need you!
We are currently seeking a third PBC partner from New South Wales or Queensland. We are also looking for PBCs or NTRBs to trial the Work Tracker Database, later in 2016.
If you are interested, please contact Dr. Belinda Burbidge.
