Noongar Land Estate
The Noongar Land Estate (NLE) is an important part of the South West Native Title Settlement (the Settlement). It will provide significant opportunities for the Noongar community to achieve improved economic, social and cultural outcomes, and will be held by the Noongar Boodja Trust.
The Noongar Land Estate will include:
up to 300,000 hectares of reserve land, and
up to 20,000 ha of freehold land
Lands eligible to be allocated to the NLE include:
unallocated crown land;
unmanaged reserves; and
Aboriginal Lands Trust (ALT) properties.
WA government agencies may also identify surplus land for potential allocation to the NLE. Furthermore, where land is unavailable for transfer but is of high cultural value to the Noongar community, there is opportunity for further discussion through the priority land meetings.
No land will be transferred into the Noongar Boodja Trust until the terms of allocation are accepted, including endorsement by the WKSN cultural advice committee and board.
The Noongar Land Estate will be assigned to one of three categories within the Trust, which each have different rules around how the land can be managed and who it can be managed by, being:
housing land,
development land, and
cultural land.