Olkola Ajin – Olkola Fire Project

This project involves strategic and planned burning of savanna areas in the high and low rainfall zones during the early dry season to reduce the risk of late dry season wild fires.

Large uncontrolled wildfires late in the dry season have become a regular feature of recent decades on the Cape York Peninsula. These high intensity wildfires emit large amounts of greenhouse gases and threaten remote cultural sites, biodiversity and infrastructure.

The savannah burning carbon farming activity involves Aboriginal traditional owners burning early in the dry season in planned mosaics across their country. This has the effect of preventing larger late-season wildfires through the continuing or renewed application of traditional burning practices, carried out by traditional owners over countless generations. This practice reduces emissions significantly, since the amount of greenhouse gases given off under traditional mosaic burning is far lower than the emissions that would otherwise result from larger uncontrolled wildfires later in the dry season.

The Olkola Ajin Savannah Burning Project provides a long-term investment stream into this remote Aboriginal community, creating local employment for traditional owner rangers to complement existing or potential government investments. The project has a positive impact on the climate reducing up to 50,000 tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions each year across an area of about 8,000 square kilometres.