The Exploring for the Future (EFTF) program is unmatched for the scale of geoscience data acquisition across northern Australia, covering 37 648 individual land parcels and 2.9 million km2. The scale of works has raised many new challenges for Geoscience Australia (GA) through the diverse range of field activities, and the numerous stakeholders from different social and cultural backgrounds, across multiple jurisdictions. Success of the program depended on the development and maintenance of a social licence to operate. This was broadly achieved for fieldwork activities through early engagement with stakeholders, including free, prior and informed consent. Here, we present two case studies of stakeholder engagement for facilitation of data collection: one focuses on broadscale, low-impact field activities associated with the AusAEM survey; and the other on Indigenous-focused engagement related to the Barkly Seismic Survey. Because of the complexity of project planning and managing such a large number of stakeholders, GA’s project governance team was expanded; it now includes a dedicated Land and Marine Access team and a commitment to adopt world-leading engagement practices. One practice is to consider impacts and benefits for all stakeholders—not just landholders—of field activities and data acquisition programs. This includes a plan for how the data are delivered back to the communities and stakeholders, and how information exchanges can be built into projects. The aim is for stakeholders to hold GA in the highest regard and understand the benefits to the Australian people, and ultimately their own communities, from the geoscientific data that GA produces. Citation: Mouthaan, R., Buchanan, S. and Sweeney, M, 2020. Land access and Indigenous engagement for Australian geoscience. In: Czarnota, K., Roach, I., Abbott, S., Haynes, M., Kositcin, N., Ray, A. and Slatter, E. (eds.) Exploring for the Future: Extended Abstracts, Geoscience Australia, Canberra, 1–4.

The Exploring for the Future (EFTF) program is unmatched for the scale of geoscience data acquisition across northern Australia, covering 37 648 individual land parcels and 2.9 million km2. The scale of works has raised many new challenges for Geoscience Australia (GA) through the diverse range of field activities, and the numerous stakeholders from different social and cultural backgrounds, across multiple jurisdictions. Success of the program depended on the development and maintenance of a social licence to operate. This was broadly achieved for fieldwork activities through early engagement with stakeholders, including free, prior and informed consent. Here, we present two case studies of stakeholder engagement for facilitation of data collection: one focuses on broadscale, low-impact field activities associated with the AusAEM survey; and the other on Indigenous-focused engagement related to the Barkly Seismic Survey. Because of the complexity of project planning and managing such a large number of stakeholders, GA’s project governance team was expanded; it now includes a dedicated Land and Marine Access team and a commitment to adopt world-leading engagement practices. One practice is to consider impacts and benefits for all stakeholders—not just landholders—of field activities and data acquisition programs. This includes a plan for how the data are delivered back to the communities and stakeholders, and how information exchanges can be built into projects. The aim is for stakeholders to hold GA in the highest regard and understand the benefits to the Australian people, and ultimately their own communities, from the geoscientific data that GA produces. Citation: Mouthaan, R., Buchanan, S. and Sweeney, M, 2020. Land access and Indigenous engagement for Australian geoscience. In: Czarnota, K., Roach, I., Abbott, S., Haynes, M., Kositcin, N., Ray, A. and Slatter, E. (eds.) Exploring for the Future: Extended Abstracts, Geoscience Australia, Canberra, 1–4.

The Exploring for the Future (EFTF) program is unmatched for the scale of geoscience data acquisition across northern Australia, covering 37 648 individual land parcels and 2.9 million km2. The scale of works has raised many new challenges for Geoscience Australia (GA) through the diverse range of field activities, and the numerous stakeholders from different social and cultural backgrounds, across multiple jurisdictions. Success of the program depended on the development and maintenance of a social licence to operate. This was broadly achieved for fieldwork activities through early engagement with stakeholders, including free, prior and informed consent. Here, we present two case studies of stakeholder engagement for facilitation of data collection: one focuses on broadscale, low-impact field activities associated with the AusAEM survey; and the other on Indigenous-focused engagement related to the Barkly Seismic Survey. Because of the complexity of project planning and managing such a large number of stakeholders, GA’s project governance team was expanded; it now includes a dedicated Land and Marine Access team and a commitment to adopt world-leading engagement practices. One practice is to consider impacts and benefits for all stakeholders—not just landholders—of field activities and data acquisition programs. This includes a plan for how the data are delivered back to the communities and stakeholders, and how information exchanges can be built into projects. The aim is for stakeholders to hold GA in the highest regard and understand the benefits to the Australian people, and ultimately their own communities, from the geoscientific data that GA produces. Citation: Mouthaan, R., Buchanan, S. and Sweeney, M, 2020. Land access and Indigenous engagement for Australian geoscience. In: Czarnota, K., Roach, I., Abbott, S., Haynes, M., Kositcin, N., Ray, A. and Slatter, E. (eds.) Exploring for the Future: Extended Abstracts, Geoscience Australia, Canberra, 1–4.

The Exploring for the Future (EFTF) program is unmatched for the scale of geoscience data acquisition across northern Australia, covering 37 648 individual land parcels and 2.9 million km2. The scale of works has raised many new challenges for Geoscience Australia (GA) through the diverse range of field activities, and the numerous stakeholders from different social and cultural backgrounds, across multiple jurisdictions. Success of the program depended on the development and maintenance of a social licence to operate. This was broadly achieved for fieldwork activities through early engagement with stakeholders, including free, prior and informed consent. Here, we present two case studies of stakeholder engagement for facilitation of data collection: one focuses on broadscale, low-impact field activities associated with the AusAEM survey; and the other on Indigenous-focused engagement related to the Barkly Seismic Survey. Because of the complexity of project planning and managing such a large number of stakeholders, GA’s project governance team was expanded; it now includes a dedicated Land and Marine Access team and a commitment to adopt world-leading engagement practices. One practice is to consider impacts and benefits for all stakeholders—not just landholders—of field activities and data acquisition programs. This includes a plan for how the data are delivered back to the communities and stakeholders, and how information exchanges can be built into projects. The aim is for stakeholders to hold GA in the highest regard and understand the benefits to the Australian people, and ultimately their own communities, from the geoscientific data that GA produces. Citation: Mouthaan, R., Buchanan, S. and Sweeney, M, 2020. Land access and Indigenous engagement for Australian geoscience. In: Czarnota, K., Roach, I., Abbott, S., Haynes, M., Kositcin, N., Ray, A. and Slatter, E. (eds.) Exploring for the Future: Extended Abstracts, Geoscience Australia, Canberra, 1–4.

Geoscience Australia conducts field activities to better understand groundwater systems in areas where land-connected stakeholders, including farmers and First Nations Australians, have rights and interests. Communicating effectively, in inclusive, transparent and accessible ways is essential to ensure non-technical stakeholders understand what message is being conveyed. Creating tools for geoscientists to use for land access and other outreach or consultations helps them plan community engagement and ensures that community members have a better understanding of Earth Science and therefore improved access to the information they need to be able to make informed decisions. Simplified animations, comic-style factsheets, and physical models have been created and tested to illustrate data acquisition techniques, what interpreted data looks like and how it is used. Tailored templates have been designed to ensure that the data collected is provided to impacted stakeholders at the end of field activities. In addition, portable, interactive groundwater exhibits and activities have been created and used at community outreach events. These have been found to be successful in holding the interest of the general public, substantially increasing the number of conversations about groundwater geoscience and exposing people to the data that is publicly available and possibly of interest to them. When used in isolation, none of the engagement tools were found to be more effective than traditional ways of communicating. Instead, information is more easily understood when communication style and engagement tools are specially selected for the audience and used in combination. Presented at the 52nd Congress of International Association of Hydrogeologists (IAH2025)

## **Abstract** This dataset and its metadata statement were supplied to the Bioregional Assessment Programme by a third party and are presented here as originally supplied. Contains boundary and attribute information for parcels of public, private and Aboriginal lands in Australia. Data are sourced primarly from government gazette notices, cadastral maps and plans. A nominal scale of around 1:5 million and a minimum 50 square kilometre threshold limit for land parcels was used in the generalisation of this product from the National Public and Aboriginal Lands data. Data is suitable for GIS applications. This map shows public and private land tenure, including Indigenous land for the whole of Australia at a scale of 1:4.7 million. The land tenure boundaries depicted on this map generally define broadly classified areas greater than 50 square kilometres. Indigenous land areas between 0.1 and 100 square kilometres are shown more comprehensively by symbols. The information on this map is complemented by statistical tables giving the total area of the land tenure categories for each State and Territory. This map is also available as free vector GIS data, ArcInfo Export, ArcView Shapefile and MapInfo mid/mif. Please direct any corrections or feedback on this map to mapfeedback@ga.gov.au. Product Specifications: Coverage: Australia Currency: Mid 1993 Coordinates: Geographical Datum: AGD66 Projection: Simple Conic on two standard parallels 18S and 36S Medium: Printed map (flat and folded); ## **Dataset History** Data was primarily sourced from Geoscience Australia's National Public and Aboriginal Lands data which contains data from State and Commonwealth Government gazettes. The Commonwealth Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Commission and State Government departments provided information on Aboriginal lands not gazetted. Other information was obtained from published maps and Geoscience Australia's National Topographic Mapping Series (NTMS). Further information can be found at http://www.ga.gov.au/metadata-gateway/metadata/record/42340/ ## **Dataset Citation** Geoscience Australia (2004) Australian Land Tenure 1993 - Geoscience Australia. Bioregional Assessment Source Dataset. Viewed 05 July 2017, http://data.bioregionalassessments.gov.au/dataset/d51a641a-df86-4b10-985a-8714b570386a.

Geoscience Australia is investing in improved access to groundwater data to support informed water management decision-making for the benefit of all Australians. In 2023, we released the National Hydrogeological Inventory (NHI) to provide a nation-wide overview of Australia’s major hydrogeological provinces. The initial release of the NHI, accessible via our online Data Delivery Portal, provides access to a wealth of data and summary information about the hydrogeology and groundwater systems of the nation’s 42 major hydrogeological provinces. This content is further enhanced by valuable contextual information about the people, communities, industries, and environmental assets that rely on groundwater within these provinces. Complementing the national-scale overview were two regional hydrogeological investigations of trans-jurisdictional aquifers of the Kati Thanda - Lake Eyre Basin in central Australia, and the South Nicholson - Georgina Basin in northern Australia. These in-depth studies included new data analysis and integration of hydrogeological, hydrochemical, geophysical and other datasets to develop improved conceptual understanding of groundwater flow systems and related processes and interactions. Under the recently announced Resourcing Australia's Prosperity Initiative, Geoscience Australia is embarking on the next phase of development to improve the NHI. Novel updates and modifications currently planned include: 1. Enhanced visualisations via the portal interface; 2. Addition of new data and narrative content for province reports; and 3. Further detailed hydrogeological studies in priority regions. As we continue to grow the NHI and its long-term vision as a national compendium of hydrogeological knowledge, we welcome input and ideas from the Australian and international hydrogeological communities. Presented at the 52nd Congress of International Association of Hydrogeologists (IAH2025)

URL: https://geoscience.data.qld.gov.au/dataset/cr042386 LAND RESOURCES OF THE BURNETT REGION, QUEENSLAND, PART 1: SOUTH BURNETT

Australia’s landscapes and resources are shaped by processes deep within the Earth. But how do we see what lies beneath our feet? At Geoscience Australia, we use a technique called passive seismic imaging, which listens to natural vibrations of the Earth rather than creating artificial signals. By deploying AusArray, the largest network of seismic sensors ever installed in Australia, we are mapping the continent’s crust and mantle in unprecedented detail. These images reveal the hidden architecture of basins, faults, and deep lithospheric structures that shape Australia’s geology. The results not only help us understand how our continent formed and evolved but also provide vital information for resource exploration and hazard assessment. This work formed part of national initiatives such as Exploring for the Future and will continue under Resourcing Australia’s Prosperity, which will deliver cutting-edge science to support Australia’s long-term prosperity.