Unfortunately, Kathryn Gledhill-Tucker has had to withdraw. We are very pleased that Rose Barrowcliffe is able to present her work on Indigenous Data in Kathryn's stead.

Herbaria hold millions of specimens collected from Indigenous lands around the world. The specimens may represent a piece of the puzzle that allows Indigenous peoples to care for their Traditional Country ('Country' for short), build sustainable incomes, and continue cultural practices. Indigenous data sovereignty (IDSov) means people have the right to manage and control these specimens as part of their environment and resources (Carroll et al. 2021, Maiam nayri Wingara and Australian Governance Institute 2018), but Indigenous peoples' ability to exercise these rights is limited due to the poor findability of the specimens.

This project, led by a Butchulla and Bundjalung-Gumgganggbir Macquarie University research team and partnering with New York Botanical Garden (NYBG), Local Contexts, the Language Data Commons of Australia (LDaCA), and Australian Academic and Research Network (AARNet), pilots processes for improving the findability of, and reconnecting botanical specimens to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. NYBG staff assisted with understanding the priorities and processes that have resulted in some Australian records being findable but not others. The Local Contexts staff shared learnings from metadata enrichment to similar items in other collections. LDaCA provided initial programming support to map the specimens' collection points and suggested language datasets to indicate who the relevant Traditional Owners might be. AARNet provided the geospatial analysis necessary for the process of inferring connections between large datasets of botanical specimens and Aboriginal groups.