Minister for Environment and Natural Resources Lauren Moss was on hand at the school yesterday to make the announcement.

Ms Moss said more than $1 million had been provided to community groups, schools and councils under the 2017/18 Environment Grants Program to support their work addressing local environmental issues.

“The Territory's natural environment is one of our greatest assets,” Ms Moss said.

“As Territorians we are strongly connected to our land in many different ways - it shapes our identity and gives us our unique perspective on life. It supports our great lifestyle, drives our thriving tourism industry and offers us a wealth of opportunities for economic development.

“We’re pleased to support grassroots efforts to protect and enhance our precious environment.”

Member for Katherine, Sandra Nelson said this is a wonderful opportunity for the MacFarlane Primary School to build on their very successful Cultural Awareness Program.

“It’s fantastic to see the efforts of MacFarlane students recognised with this grant that will make a big difference to their environmental work,” Ms Nelson said.

Ms Moss said the Environmental Grants program supported action-based projects promoting ecological sustainability and building awareness of the cumulative impacts of our personal behaviour and lifestyle choices.

Continuing the multi-year agreements and delivering on the Territory Labor Government’s election commitment, grants to key stakeholder groups to support engagement in environmental reforms and Government policy development have gone to:

$100,000 to the  Environment Centre of the NT

$100,000 to the Arid Lands Environment Centre 

$50,000 to the Environmental Defenders Office

$30,000 to the Australia Marine Conservation Society.

A further $443,487 has been allocated in three grant categories including:

Seven Small Environmental Project Grants that support communities to pursue initiatives that deal with or raise environmental awareness

16 Environmental Project Grants for projects up to one year that reduce environmental harm and raise environmental awareness

Five Container Deposit Scheme Infrastructure Grants to provide Northern Territory organisations the opportunity to acquire infrastructure for the purpose of collecting approved containers for redemption at a Container Deposit Depot.

$320,000 has been allocated to regional and remote areas in the NT including Alice Springs, Adelaide River, East Arnhem, Victoria and Daly Rivers’ region, the West Daly region and Litchfield region.

This funding will assist communities to ‘look after country’ through waste reduction, reuse and recycling programs, infrastructure and education.  A number of projects aimed at rehabilitation of important systems and weed management have also been supported.

“The commitment of our regional and remote communities to improving environmental outcomes is inspiring and I look forward to hearing the outcomes of these projects,” Ms Moss said