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ORIC Spotlight On: Cool burning for country and community

15 March 2022
Jobs, Land and Economy
A eucalyptus forest with low-burning flames and gentle smoke.

Firesticks Alliance Indigenous Corporation knows that cultural burning is integral to land management, and a powerful mitigation for the risk of catastrophic wildfire.

Firesticks Alliance Indigenous Corporation knows that cultural burning is integral to land management, and a powerful mitigation for the risk of catastrophic wildfire. It has been running workshops for cultural burning throughout eastern Australia for years, playing the long game to change how state authorities, farmers and communities manage the land. Since the black summer of 2019–20, the corporation’s grown a lot and quickly.

Cultural burning has significant benefits. Whereas wildfire can destroy everything in its path, cultural burning nurtures native wildlife and can revive damaged Country. Importantly, the flames in a cultural burn don’t reach the canopy. What’s left behind is charcoal, unlike the grey ash which comes as a result of a wildfire.

Learn more about Firesticks Alliance and their cultural burning workshops in this month’s Spotlight On from the Office of the Registrar of Indigenous Corporations.