TRADITIONAL Owners and Indigenous rangers have met in the Red Centre near Uluru to discuss land- management priorities for about one-third of Australia’s land mass. 

The Indigenous Desert Alliance Conference in Yulara is the largest gathering of its kind in Australia and it hosted more than 400 delegates and 50 desert ranger groups over three days last week. 

IDA chair and Nyangumarta Elder Nyaparu Rose said this year’s conference was focused on fire management to limit wildfires, while protecting cultural sites and the habitats of threatened species such as the bilby, the night parrot and the great desert skink. 

“Burning starts up when it’s green after the rain, because it doesn’t flare up, and it’s a small burning,” Ms Rose said.