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The Willandra Lakes Region World Heritage Area, New South Wales, Australia: Land Use Planning and Management of Aboriginal and Archaeological Heritage

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Archaeological Dimension of World Heritage

Part of the book series: SpringerBriefs in Archaeology ((BRIEFSARCHHERIT))

Abstract

The Willandra Lakes Region is a series of dry lakes in southwest New South Wales, Australia, set within a semiarid landscape. The region covers some 239,000 hectares and was inscribed on the World Heritage List in 1981. Since world heritage inscription, the region has been transformed. Plans of management have been developed at the regional, property and individual archaeological site level. Mungo National Park has expanded significantly and now encompasses many of the key archaeological sites. Grazing and cropping continue on private lands in the World Heritage Region, but the pattern of land use in these areas has been extensively modified to reduce the impacts of grazing on the fragile soils and the archaeological values they contain. All of these actions have been designed to improve the conservation of archaeological values and have involved long-term and ongoing consultation and planning between private landholders, Aboriginal Elders, government land managers and academic researchers.

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Acknowledgments

 This paper was prepared with the support of the NSW Office of Environment and Heritage. Permission and support from the Willandra TTG’s is gratefully acknowledged. The committee members of the CMC, TSAC and staff of the NPWS, Department of Lands and Department of Primary Industry provided useful comments and corrections on earlier drafts of this paper and also provided stimulating discussion on some of the issues herein.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. New South Wales, Office of Environment and Heritage, 318, Buronga, NSW, 2739, Australia

    H. Johnston

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  1. H. Johnston
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Correspondence to H. Johnston .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Universidad Complutense de Madrid Department o de Prehistoria, Madrid, Spain

    Alicia Castillo

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Johnston, H. (2014). The Willandra Lakes Region World Heritage Area, New South Wales, Australia: Land Use Planning and Management of Aboriginal and Archaeological Heritage. In: Castillo, A. (eds) Archaeological Dimension of World Heritage. SpringerBriefs in Archaeology(). Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4939-0283-5_4

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