The Songlines Project
Australian Conservation Foundation
Philanthropic Stakeholder Engagement Through Country
The Songlines Project was built on a simple but radical premise: that direct, embodied encounter with country could generate a quality of environmental advocacy that no conventional engagement process could match.
Over nine days, a carefully selected group of influential stakeholders and high net worth (HNW) donors walked the Lurujarri Heritage Trail in the Kimberley region of Western Australia, guided by the Goolarabooloo families in their ancestral country. The trail passes through the Walmadany/James Price Point site, where a proposed Liquid Natural Gas terminal threatened one of the most significant stretches of coastline in the region.
I advised on the overall design of the project, participant engagement, and programme evaluation.
The project increased HNW donor support, including through intergenerational engagement. It also helped raise the profile of, and advocacy against, the LNG terminal project.
In 2013, the Australian Supreme Court of Western Australia declined the gas terminal proposal.
