Abstract: Since late 2005, we have collaborated, as an Indigenous Research Fellow and Ethno-ecologist respectively, on a bush food and harvesting research project. The project aims to examine the sustainability of small-scale commercial ‘wild’ harvest and the attitudes, knowledge and practices of Aboriginal harvesters and traders in relation to the collection and sale of bush foods. Over more than 5,000 years, desert Aboriginal people have refined their knowledge about the use and management of bush foods, medicines and other natural products. Customary management included complex governance systems and applied manipulation of species and ecosystems. Harvesting for domestic use and small-scale commercial trade continues today using traditional knowledge and harvesting methods. In the past 10 years, commercial markets dominated by non-Aboriginal people have rapidly expanded, as has research into bush foods and other produce.
Notes: scroll to pg. 36