A NSW Government website

Water
Regional water strategies program

Engagement with Aboriginal communities

The key themes that emerged during our consultation with the Aboriginal communities included Aboriginal people’s water rights, and Aboriginal knowledge and connection to Country.

Aboriginal community engagement

A comprehensive engagement and consultation program accompanied the release of the draft strategy. This included:

  • face-to-face meetings
  • online webinars
  • formal submissions.

The table below shows the extent of Aboriginal engagement in all regions during the development of the regional water strategies. The locations were chosen considering the access to Aboriginal communities.

RegionNumber of engagement sessions
Border Rivers9
Gwydir13
Lachlan13
Macquarie-Castlereagh12
Far North Coast17
Murray and Murrumbidgee18
Namoi11
North Coast16
South Coast17
Western17

Submissions

We are sharing collected community and stakeholder submissions for all regions. The current overview of submissions are from public consultation phase 1, more submissions might be added in time.

What we heard

The 'Cultural Snapshots' below summarise the key issues and ideas we heard during the first public consultation. They highlight how your feedback has informed the next steps in developing the draft regional water strategies. You can also learn more about this on our ‘what we heard’ pages per regions.

Region Cultural snapshot
Namoi Fact sheet (PDF, 856.4 KB)
North Coast Fact sheet (PDF, 749.24 KB)
Far North Coast Fact sheet (PDF, 795.53 KB)
South Coast Fact sheet (PDF, 804.35 KB)
Border Rivers Fact sheet (PDF, 763.73 KB)
Lachlan Fact sheet (PDF, 852.14 KB)
Gwydir Fact sheet (PDF, 758.16 KB)
Macquarie-Castlereagh Fact sheet (PDF, 832.09 KB)