Indigenous Economic Development Strategy

Question: Discuss about the Indigenous Economic Development Strategy. Answer: Introduction: The indigenous people in Australia are facing various social and economic challenges such as the unemployment rates that are much higher compared to the non-indigenous people. The article also notes that the income rates and the business ownership of the indigenous people are considerably low that has been attributed to the lack of education and vocational training as well as the lack of enough business knowledge. Furthermore, a larger population of the indigenous people is living in the regional and remote areas where the prospects for employment are few and the available opportunities are the small businesses and the public sector that has also been decreasing. The tourism department has been identified by many state governments to be the suitable sector to offer development opportunities to the indigenous people including entrepreneurship and employment opportunities in the regional and rural areas (Schmiechen Boyle, 2007). To be able to assist the development of the indigenous people, Australia has been formulating and implementing various agencies that are mandated to support, encourage and represent the development of the indigenous tourism such as the Business Ready Program for Indigenous Tourism (BRPIT) mentoring program. The BRPIT was developed to allow the selected tourism businesses to become ready by providing them with a capacity building for their operators. The capacity building is acknowledged is Australia as a significant strategy that helps the indigenous people to come out their disadvantaged positions as well as reducing their welfare dependency (NSW Ombudsman, 2011). In the history of Australia, the successive governments have been introducing many programs aiming to facilitate the development of indigenous businesses. However, most of the initiatives by the governments have failed to meet their objectives probably because of the economic factors and the neglect of the socio-political and the environmental aspects that saw the commoditization of the indigenous arts and culture (Commonwealth of Australia, 2010). Many analysts have argued that these programs dwelled more on the development of the indigenous enterprises and never considered any indigenous business reviews. Because the pioneer policies and programs failed to make significant improvements, BRPIT aimed at providing flexible and customized support to improve the capacity of the emerging indigenous tourism businesses as well as those that were already established. More specifically the BRPIT was formed to address the potential barriers hindering the successful development of the indigeno us tourism business including the lack of effective management skills and business planning and marketing expertise (Pink Allbon, 2008). The BRPIT can be considered a successful program that facilitated the development of the indigenous tourism services and their businesses. Also, aside from its success in meeting its objectives, there are insights that should the BRPIT be taken through a few improvements, it could bore many benefits for to the aboriginal businesses and consequently, indirect benefits to the aboriginal communities and the Australian tourism industry. Also, there are insights that the support of the government is highly significant in creating employment for the indigenous. Also to note is that the timely capacity building programs are critical for the provision of professional advice and mentoring through all stages of the development. It is also important that the aboriginals are involved in the development programs to facilitate tailoring of these programs to meet their needs. References Commonwealth of Australia (2010). Indigenous Economic Development StrategyDraft for Consultation. https://resources.fahcsia.gov.au/IEDS/ieds_strategy_v4.pdf NSW Ombudsman (2011). Addressing Aboriginal disadvantage: The need to do things differently, A Special Report to Parliament under s 31 of the Ombudsman Act 1974.Syd-ney: NSW Ombudsman. Pink, B., Allbon, P. (2008). The health and welfare of Australia's Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples 2008.Canberra: Australian Bureau of Statistics Australian Institute of Health and Welfare. Schmiechen, J., Boyle, A. (2007). Aboriginal tourism research in Australia.