First Hand Solutions Aboriginal Corporation
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Mission Statement
First Hand Solutions exists to improve the lives of Aboriginal people through continuation of culture, connection to country, providing training & employment and economic development opportunities through art, craft, tourism, bushfood & native plants
About This Cause
First Hand Solutions Aboriginal Corporation (FHS or First Hand) began in October 2012 and was started by proud Bidjigal man Peter Cooley who grew up in the La Perouse Aboriginal Community on the northern foreshore of Botany Bay in Sydney's south & his partner Sarah Martin who has extensive skills, knowledge and experience in establishing successful social enterprises that support disadvantaged Australians. We are a ground breaking organisation that finds hands on solutions to complex issues and barriers faced by Aboriginal people in Australia in regards to continuation and protection of culture, connection to country and land, health & well-being, employment & training, economic and business development and community capacity building and leadership. When establishing our programs and projects it was agreed that every activity would be underpinned by culture. This meant that any program or project must first provide a way of connecting Aboriginal people to culture and/or country because we know it's the fundamental foundation of strength & resilience of our people and strengthens their identity, confidence and self esteem to enable them to tackle challenge which builds confident leaders, families & communities. FHS has two key areas of operation - Economic Development & Social Enterprise Economic Development Blak Markets - This initiative was created in 2014 to support small Aboriginal businesses working in art, craft, tourism & bushfood. By creating a marketplace for these small businesses to operate from and providing targeted marketing & market stallholder insurance, we help to propel these businesses Infront of the waiting market to buy their products & services. With 10 years of running the Blak Markets now under our belt, We have now worked with and helped over 100 small Aboriginal businesses into the marketplace with the overwhelming majority now flourishing in the wider marketplace. These businesses have also generated over $4.5m in revenue and it has provided employment for no less than 20 local Aboriginal people working at the market. www.blakmarkets.com.au National Indigenous Art Fair (NIAF) - This initiative was created in 2017 to support remote Aboriginal artists, art centres and communities to showcase their works in Australia's biggest marketplace in Sydney. By supporting these remote people and art centres to come to NIAF, we are opening much bigger opportunities to build and strengthen new relationships and networks, meet new people and increase their customer bases both domestically and Internationally. NIAF has been attended by over 65,000 people since it began and has generated more than $4m for these remote businesses. www.niaf.com.au Social Enterprise IndigiGrow - www.indigigrow.com.au This is 100% Aboriginal owned, run & staffed not for profit native Plant nursery & Native bushfood farm based in La Perouse & Matraville, NSW. IndigiGrow has two key focus areas, Native bushfoods & Critically endangered local plants. IndigiGrow is now 6 years old and has grown from humble beginnings to now employ 10 local Aboriginal staff where 8 are full-time and 6 of the 10 were young Aboriginal apprentices but 3 recently completed their apprenticeships and 2 have now been appointed nursery managers. Our staff are propagating and growing up to 80 native bushfood plant species and long with 40 species from the critically endangered Eastern Suburbs Banksia Scrub (ESBS) which is coastal Sydney's original plants community which once spanned 5300ha before European arrival but now only 146ha remains today. As traditional custodians where ESBS grows, we are alarmed at the possibility of our plants that have sustained our people for thousands of years could be extinct from our traditional lands and important parts of our culture and lost forever. IndigiGrow also runs educational and sustainability programs for communities and schools about Native foods and endangered plants. We also grow plants that our elders talk about foraging for when they were kids but are now very scarce in the wild but we are having great success at reviving them and reconnecting our people to our plants. Looking to the future, we would like to continue to employ our young people, put them in apprenticeships and train & develop them into leaders with life long careers.