Applications for the 2023 National Indigenous Mapping Workshop Austalia now open

[Perth, WA] Indigenous Mapping Workshop (IMW) Australia, the country's largest Indigenous-led mapping initiative run by geospatial and cloud company Winyama, will later this year be hosting mapping training in Narrm (Melbourne) for approximately 150 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders who care for the Indigenous land estate.

Providing free training in geospatial software, IMW Australia helps Indigenous organisations and communities advocate for their rights and interests and learn skills to more efficiently manage Country.

Now in its fifth year, more than 1000 Indigenous Australians have completed training through the initiative; covering topics like 3D storytelling in Google Earth, pre-burn fire management with QGIS and data management best practice.

Led by the First Nations team at Winyama, the social initiative is helping close the digital gap in Australia.

Managing Director of Winyama, Andrew Dowding believes that mapping is a means to bridging the digital divide, especially when it comes to people who are living in some of Australia’s remotest Indigenous communities. Many of these Indigenous communities are looking after vast amounts of land assets and cultural information. Which is why, Dowding says, teaching geospatial skills is so relevant.

“Indigenous communities really understand their land. They manage huge estates under their native title and ranger programs and are doing great amounts of natural resource management. While they are managing these assets, they are recording all of this information— this data. Multimedia of Elders talking about Country, knowledge about the plants and animals in the area, drone information, spatial information.”

“There’s a lot of digital work out there in the bush. At the moment, Indigenous ranger programs are an unrecognised pathway into the digital economy but actually, a ranger is emerging as a digital worker.”

“We don’t want people to feel like they need to leave their Country to find work in the digital economy, they shouldn’t need to come down to the city. Their work is increasingly moving to apps, drones, and mapping platforms and we need to match our training and education pathways.”

Winyama is incredibly excited to host a large-scale workshop again after only being able to offer small scale regional events and online training over the last three years.

First Nations Australians working in Indigenous land management, language and arts conservation are encouraged to apply. The four-day training workshop is free to attend, excluding travel, accommodation, and some food costs. The workshop is a means for Indigenous people to be trained on technical mapping software that their organisation may not have previously had the chance to upskill their employees in.