HECS-type loans for First Nations landholders offer long term benefits

RELATED: Recommendation made to Regional Investment Corporation in 2024 

Chris Andrew, advisor to the Waluwin Foundation, explained the idea of a Ngama bangalnarranarra or Mother Earth Loan, during a panel session evokeAG. 2025, exploring the role of agritech in empowering First Nations’ land stewardship. 

“First Nations people have been excluded from the economy, preventing them from creating the intergenerational wealth needed to manage uncertainties like climate change. Farming in Australia is a challenging business, and climate change has increased its unpredictability,” said Mr Andrew, who has a background in global investment banking. 

“Those who desire to be farmers face two problems: they can’t afford to buy the farm, and they can’t farm the way they want to. The bank only offers a whitefella loan imported from England 200 years ago, which doesn’t make sense when droughts, floods and other events mean you’re not going to get the same revenue each year. 

 “What would a blackfella loan look like? It would say, ‘Here’s $100, if you have a good year, repay us $10. If the next year is a drought, pause the loan. Let Mother Earth rest, so when the rain comes and the drought breaks, it’s better suited to bounce back.’” 

Mr Andrew said the loan would operate in the same way as HECS-HELP, the Higher Education Loan Program, which isn’t required to be repaid until the graduate is earning above a set income level. 

Panelist from left to right: Elizabeth Walker, Chris Andrew, Joshua Gilbert, Ryan James and Nini Mills.

No drought subsidies needed, and repayments made without pressure 

“So, like HECS, if the farm is making money, pay it back. That allows First Nations landholders to show respect to Mother Earth. It avoids the anxiety from the pressure of paying back the loan and allows the First Nations farmer to look after the soil, the biodiversity, to maintain the country exactly the way it was managed before. 

“Over a period of time it’ll probably be paid back faster than a traditional loan. And you won’t need government subsidies to support farmers to repay loans in a drought.” 

Waluwin Foundation was established to create a traditional whole-of-landscape response to support First Nations people to acquire and operate freehold title farmland. 

Its business model hinges on First Nations-designed financing for agriculture and agribusiness and supporting First Nations farmers and agribusinesses to leverage their provenance story to create sustainable income. 

“Here’s a First Nations-designed loan system that draws on 60,000 years of knowledge, on a culture that has managed unpredictability and been able to adapt, rather than applying the English financial system. We can see the damage that’s caused,” Mr Andrew said. 

“We have a financial system that doesn’t ‘get’ Australia. We have floods, we have droughts, we have intense fires, so why wouldn’t we finance with that knowledge?” 

Chris Andrew on the panel at evokeᴬᴳ⋅ 2025.

Flexible finance model should be available to all farmers 

Flexible finance models would allow First Nations people to flourish without compromising the values important to them as custodians and caretakers, he said, but the loan system would benefit all farmers. 

“There’s a whole dearth of young farmers who can’t afford to buy the farm, whether they’re First Nations or not, because of the uncertainty of climate change and that level of risk. 

“And if we can de-risk some of the finance obligation, it enables the whole agricultural sector to move forward a bit more easily. It’s important to acknowledge that what’s unlocking this is First Nations design and thinking.” 

NRL player says finance ‘hard to get’ for First Nations ventures 

Fellow panellist and successful First Nations footballer, Ryan James, said despite earning hundreds of thousands of dollars playing in the NRL, he had found it hard to get finance. 

“Lots of traditional owners and First Nations land groups are land and asset-rich but business poor, and getting access to capital is a challenge,” said Mr Ryan, CEO of Indigenous Innovation Ventures. 

“We need more First Nations people in the finance industry, and we need to take a holistic view of financing First Nations ventures.” 

Ryan James in discussion on the panel.

Agritech challenged to engage with First Nations people 

Also on the panel was Nini Mills, CEO of Nyamba Buru Yawuru Ltd, which represents Native Title Holders of the Broome region of WA, and manages 530,000ha of multi-tenure, multi-faceted lands and communities including 276,000ha of cattle stations. 

Ms Mills challenged the agritech audience to consider how to engage with First Nations people, to understand the value proposition and drive real prosperity. 

“Understand how to develop agritech that is inclusive of First Nations information and knowledge,” she said. 

“Ask how traditional knowledge and practices can advance agritech to ensure more sustainable economic development, businesses and opportunities for people in communities in their own right, but for the country more broadly.” 

Mr Andrew acknowledged the social and economic benefits being created by the ‘vertical stack’ of Nyamba Buru Yawuru Ltd’s interests in cultural tourism, agritourism, irrigation and beef production, and said agritech had a role to play in filling a knowledge gap. 

“Remember, a lot of First Nations people have been kept off these landscapes, so there’s been no adaptive land management practices. Certain elements like fire, crops, the grasses that they would have known, will be different today. 

“So what does tech do to fill a knowledge gap when you can’t adapt traditional practices of thousands of years to these damaged landscapes? I think there’s opportunities for the agritech sector to unlock some of that knowledge. 

“You don’t need a blackfella to build it but have a think about how they might approach it and make sure they are the beneficiaries of what comes out of that thinking,” he said.