Tuvaluan migrants build new life in Australia
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
SBS Australia
an hour ago
- SBS Australia
A Voice of Strength: Marina Benjamin's Poetry Empowers Assyrian Women
Independent news and stories connecting you to life in Australia and Assyrian-speaking Australians. SBS World News Take a global view with Australia's most comprehensive world news service Watch now
SBS Australia
5 hours ago
- SBS Australia
Traditional owners hope rock art heritage listing will attract eyes of the world
Listen to Australian and world news, and follow trending topics with SBS News Podcasts . Among the red rock hills of Murujuga in Western Australia's Pilbara region are a million ancient rock engravings. Some of the engravings date back 50,000 years, making them older than Stone Henge and the Pyramids of Giza. The ancient petroglyphs include the oldest known depiction of a human face, as well as engravings of plants and animals, some of which are now extinct. Traditional owners have long campaigned to protect the art - and now, their bid for a UNESCO World Heritage listing has ended with triumph in Paris. "I therefore declare the decision 47-8B.13 adopted as amended." UNESCO says their decision recognises that the site represents 'a masterpiece of human creative genius'; is a unique testimony to a cultural tradition; and finally, that the site is an outstanding example of a cultural or human settlement showing interaction with the environment. Chair of the Murujuga Aboriginal Corporation ((MAC)), Peter Hicks, travelled to Paris for the momentous decision. "Inscribed into the history books is a great, great outcome for us, the Aboriginal people. It's a nomination led by Aboriginal people, for Aboriginal people, and guided by the Aboriginal people. And therefore it is a world first." Peter Jeffries is also from the Murujuga Aboriginal Corporation, which has led the campaign. He says it's been years in the making. "It's been in motion now for two or three decades, and we've lost a lot of our old elders in the process. So this is also in recognition of their support, as well." But while the Corporation's campaign has gone on for decades, it wasn't until 2023 that the Australian Government nominated the Murujuga Cultural Landscape for World Heritage status. Australia's application was referred back to the government in May, after UNESCO suggested state and federal governments needed to do more to address concerns that acid emissions from Woodside's nearby gas project were damaging the engravings. The peninsula in northwest WA near Karratha is home to two gas plants, a fertiliser plant and iron ore and salt export facilities. Environment Minister Senator Murray Watt argued those emission claims were based on inaccuracies, drawing on a report by about 50 scientists who said the emissions showed there was no ongoing risk to the engravings. "In the end, what persuaded the committee was the scientific evidence that was put forward which disputed some of the claims being made but also the genuine passion from the traditional owners to see this world heritage listing be secured." The Minister was also in Paris for the announcement, declaring the government was committed to protecting the site now and for future generations. "On behalf of the Australian government I am honoured to accept this inscription. Australia is thrilled with the committee's decision to inscribe the Murujuga's Cultural Landscape on the World Heritage List. This has been an Indigenous-led nomination and this victory belongs to the Ngarda-Ngarli, the traditional owners and custodians of Murujuga, whose deep knowledge and cultural leadership and enduring connection to country are at the heart of this inscription. But concerns about the potential impacts of pollution on the rock art have not gone away with the listing. Australian Conservation Foundation chief executive Kelly O'Shanassy says the world is watching now Murujuga is a world heritage site, and has urged the federal environment minister to reject Woodside's provisional gas project extension. Conditions of the approval which relate to emissions from the plant are still being negotiated. And while the 21 member nations unanimously supported the UNESCO listing, they requested Australia continue to research the effects neighbouring industry has on the rock art, and report its findings to the U-N next year. A Woodside spokesperson has responded in a statement to SBS: "The company has been a proud supporter of the World Heritage nomination and assessment process, and the company looks forward to continuing to work closely with the Murujuga Aboriginal Corporation and Traditional Custodians on the continued protection and management of this globally significant area." Still, Mardathoonera woman and Murujuga traditional custodian Raelene Cooper says culture and industry cannot co-exist, and she remains worried about the long term impacts of emissions on the rock art. Peter Hicks says the Ngarda-Ngarli people will remain dedicated to protecting the site. "Today we create our own stories in the stone, but with some care and protection of our culture like our ancestors have always done for fifty thousand years."
News.com.au
7 hours ago
- News.com.au
Faced with US heat waves, the Navajo push for power -- and A/C
Workmen plant electricity poles in the rust-orange earth of the Navajo Nation and run cables to Christine Shorty's house -- finally giving her power against the searing Arizona desert heat. It will be a luxury in the vast Native American reservation, the largest in the United States, where more than 10,000 families are still without electricity and therefore air conditioning. "It's climate change. It's getting hotter," Shorty tells AFP. "This would be easier for us with the fan and maybe air conditioning. And we look forward to that." In her 70 years, Shorty has seen her isolated, tiny hamlet of Tonalea, a dot in the enormous area of the reservation, change dramatically. Summer monsoon rains are rarer, and temperatures can touch 104 degrees Fahrenheit (40 degrees Celsius) in July and August -- previously unthinkable in the hamlet, located on a plateau at an altitude of 5,700 feet (1,730 meters). The area's seasonal lakes are drying up, and in some years the livestock are dying of thirst. Like many others, Shorty has a generator and small solar panels that allow her to power a gas fridge, cook and watch television. But their power is limited, and she often has to choose which appliance to plug in. Being hooked up to the electrical grid is "a big change. It's going to make my life a lot easier," she tells AFP. - 'Survival mode' - Most of the United States was electrified in the 1930s under president Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal initiatives. But in the Navajo Nation, which stretches across Arizona, New Mexico and Utah, the first efforts only began in the 1960s, and there are still not enough power lines. "This area was looked over," says Deenise Becenti of the Navajo Tribal Utility Authority (NTUA), the agency that manages the reservation's infrastructure. "That surprises many people. They're saying, you know, why are there third world conditions that exist here in the United States, the greatest country in the world?" To catch up, the semi-autonomous government of the reservation launched the "Light Up Navajo" project in 2019. The humanitarian initiative sees electricity companies from all over the country send their employees to work in the reservation for around a dozen weeks a year. Since 2019, electricity has been supplied to 5,000 families in the reservation, including 1,000 thanks to "Light Up Navajo," Becenti said. But as climate change drives temperatures higher, families still without power in the reservation -- where many live below the poverty rate and unemployment is high -- are in "survival mode," she said. - 'Angry' - Elbert Yazzie's mobile home turns into a furnace in the summer, and he has already lost one member of his extended family to heat stroke. "I used to like the heat," the 54-year-old, who lives in nearby Tuba City, tells AFP. "But when you get older I guess your body can't take it no more." His home was finally connected to electricity just weeks ago. Since then, he has rigged up an evaporative air cooler, also known as a "swamp cooler," by salvaging three broken appliances from a garbage dump. "Now we can turn on the A/C anytime we want, so we don't have to worry about the heat, and the generator and the gas, and all that stuff," he says. "Now we don't have to go to (other) people's houses to cool down, we can just stay home, relax, watch TV, things like that." He and Shorty are the fortunate ones. Without more funding, connecting the remaining 10,000 Navajo families without electricity could take another two decades, Becenti says. That is far too long for Gilberta Cortes, who no longer dares let her children play outside in the summer, for fear of getting heat-exacerbated nosebleeds. An electricity pole has just been erected in front of the 42-year-old's house and a line is due to be extended to her in a few months' time. But she has endured too much false hope to be serene. "My mom and dad were in their 20s, they were promised power," but it never materialized, she says. "I'm still angry."
