Community forestry in Australia: Caring for Country, land, and the bush

Community forestry in Australia is expressed in two primary forms: by Australias First Nations peoples exercising their responsibilities in caring for Country, and through a Landcare movement dedicated to restoration of native vegetation, primarily but not exclusively on private land. A third form, community management of public forests, is poorly developed, although new opportunities are emerging. The Indigenous land rights and Landcare movements emerged and developed from the 1960s to the1980s, and each has surged and ebbed in conjunction with political, social, and programmatic support. The Indigenous Estate, over which First Nations Australians have some combination of exclusive or non-exclusive possession, management or co-management rights, or other special rights, now comprises 57 per cent of Australias land area and 52 per cent of its forests. Some models of Indigenous management and co-management, particularly those for conservation and ecosystem services, are well established and successful in some respects. In principle, Landcare applies across the 58 per cent of Australias land area used by agricultural enterprises, and on some public lands; in practice, despite a large number of community-based groups, its impact has been largely localised, and the volunteer momentum essential to its success has been hard to sustain. Of Australias forests, 16 per cent are under public tenures on which community forestry could be practised, but community participation has seldom extended beyond consultation processes. We identify three critical issues and challenges to the further development of community forestry in Australia: the unfinished business of reconciliation between First Nations and non-Indigenous Australians, institutional arrangements for forest management, and the conjunction of the legacy impacts of European settlement and the accelerating impacts of climate change; and suggest starting points to address these.