Australian Aboriginal Studies 2010/1 57 Introduction For the last 65 years we have witnessed the decline in the health, wildlife and other resources of the lakes and river, made worse by the deliberate introduction of exotic species…and destructive farming practices… As a result of this destructive land manage- ment, the Coorong, for thousands of years a major focus of our culture and economy, began to deteriorate and is rapidly dying today (Ngarrindjeri Tendi et al. 2006:15). In Australia the closing decades of the twentieth century saw a number of fundamental changes relating to land rights, commencing with Indi- genous Australians being included in the census as citizens (1967), followed by the enactment of an array of national and state land rights and cultur- al heritage protection legislation, and culminat- ing in the Native Title Act 1993 (Cth), which provides for recognition of the pre-existing rights of Indigenous peoples to lands and waters. The international legal arena concurrently experienced A time for change? Indigenous heritage values and management practice in the Coorong and Lower Murray Lakes region, South Australia Lynley A Wallis Aboriginal Environments Research Centre, The University of Queensland Alice C Gorman Department of Archaeology, Flinders University Abstract: The Coorong and Lower Murray Lakes in South Australia have long been recognised under the Ramsar Convention for their natural heritage values. Less well known is the fact that this area also has high social and cultural values, encom- passing the traditional lands and waters (ruwe) of the Ngarrindjeri Nation. This unique ecosystem is currently teetering on the verge of collapse, a situation argu- ably brought about by prolonged drought after decades of unsustainable manage- ment practices. While at the federal level there have been moves to better integrate typically disparate ‘cultural’ and ‘natural’ heritage management regimes — there- by supporting Indigenous groups in their attempts to gain a greater voice in how their traditional country is managed — the distance has not yet been bridged in the Coorong. Here, current management planning continues to emphasise natural heritage values, with limited practical integration of cultural values or Ngarrindjeri viewpoints. As the future of the Coorong and Lower Murray Lakes is being debat- ed, we suggest decision makers would do well to look to the Ngarrindjeri for guid- ance on the integration of natural and cultural values in management regimes as a vital step towards securing the long-term ecological viability of this iconic part of Australia.