The Noongar Land Enterprise (NLE) Group is Australia’s only Aboriginal led grower group. First formed in 2014 the group started when a number of Aboriginal organisations on Noongar boodja (country) reacquired their land.
The landholders came together to share knowledge and learnings so they could help support each other to overcome common barriers and build businesses which were both culturally appropriate and commercially sustainable.
Now a decade later, NLE is fostering success for its members in everything from livestock, building natural assets, first nations agriculture, regenerative agriculture, land reforestation conservation and agricultural tourism.
Bush food production, honey, sandalwood, cultural tourism, social services and other mainstream agriculture and horticulture enterprises are all part of either NLE’s or NLE member enterprises that are being developed.
“Well over 50% of Australia’s land mass now is either owned or managed by Aboriginal people but currently the productivity of that land is punching well below its weight due to a range of constraints.
Our aim is to build a pathway to increase the productivity of Aboriginal owned and managed land right across Australia.”
A key turning point for the organisation came in 2020 when funding from the Indigenous Land and Sea Corporation and Department of Primary Industries and Regional Development enabled the group to employ it’s first CEO, Alan Beattie. In 2021, Macdoch Foundation came on board to help support operational costs.
This support and new leadership transformed the group allowing them to begin a new chapter and take on projects like a native seedling nursery near Northam.
When NLE first purchased the nursery it was almost defunct, now only a few years on it is producing more than 600,000 seedlings yearly and the largest employer of Aboriginal people in Northam. Renamed Boola Boornap (Place of Many Trees), it is located 1.5 hours North East of Perth.
Alan Beattie, CEO of Noongar Land Enterprise, said the success of the nursery and how it is benefiting the local people is a clear example of how practices which give back to the country can reap social, cultural, environmental and economic rewards.
“For over 65,000 years, the Aboriginal people of Australia have been strongly connected to country with a deep understanding of time, place and culture.” said Mr Beattie.
NLE group today uses the Noongar peoples deep understanding of their land to care for country while also reaping economic rewards to provide better social, environmental and cultural outcomes for Noongar people and the broader community.
Find out more about Noongar Land Enterprise here.
