Employment projects restore hope to SA Riverland

Mission Australia Employment Solutions' (ES) work with local community partners to provide training and employment opportunities in South Australia’s Riverland was recently highlighted in a report by James Hancock on ABC News.

For many years families have been leaving the Gerard Reserve, an Aboriginal Community about 20 kilometres south of Berri, in search of work.

However, employment projects run by Mission Australia ES, in partnership with local community stakeholders Career Employment Group, TAFE SA, the SA Department of Further Education, Employment, Science and Technology and the Department of Education, Employment and Workplace Relations, are beginning to bear fruit and create new opportunities in the Murray River town.

ABC News recently spoke to Philip Johnson, a Mission Australia job seeker who left Gerard for nearby Barmera in search of work who is now helping to upgrade the local cemetery as part of the traineeship program.

"Quite a few of us was all just mainly on the dole, had nothing to look forward to,” Mr Johnson said. “But now, since we started this project, we've got something looking forward to. Our families lay here as well, right back from our great grandparents to our grandparents and to our mothers and fathers, as well as brothers and uncles and aunties.”

He is now considering returning to the community with his family. Mr Johnson is one of nine trainees – men and women of varying ages – working on local regeneration projects, including tree planting and home beautification work. On completing the 12-month traineeship, he will receive Conservation and Land Management accreditation through TAFE SA.

Employment Solutions Business Manager, Sue Harmer, said such projects were “the icing on the cake” after many years of working in the community. “Over the past five years Mission Australia has continued to build strong relationships with the local people, particularly through the Kungun Community Centre,” Ms Harmer said.

“It’s all coming together now. For example, we were recently successful in helping job seekers secure positions with Woolworths through an Indigenous Employment Program (IEP) and ongoing collaboration with partners to offer accredited traineeships to our Indigenous job seekers to provide the skills needed to enter mainstream employment. 

“We are honoured to work in this community and it’s wonderful to see that local people are benefitting from these partnerships.”

Mission Australia Riverland job seekers are also being offered a new training opportunity, in partnership with the Aboriginal Lands Trust and SA Murray-Darling and National Resource Management Board, to commence in February 2012. Known as the Aboriginal Learning on Country (ALoC) Kungun Centre Project, it will offer four traineeships in Certificate III Indigenous Land Management, and the opportunity to work on the Regent Parrot Recovery Project.

Further information

• Read James Hancock’s report for ABC News. 
• Find out more about Mission Australia Employment Solutions