Circularity, community and connection to country are more than just buzzwords for Tanya Egerton.
They are the guiding principles that have led to her being crowned the national winner of the 2024 AgriFutures Rural Women’s Award, for her work empowering Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples in remote areas.
"When we believe in the strength of community, the power of co-creation and the value of relationships built on respect, we can make the seemingly impossible possible," Ms Egerton said.
The Northern Territory-based founder and CEO of Circulanation and the Remote OpShop Project received the award at a packed ceremony at Parliament House, where Prime Minister Anthony Albanese gave the opening speech.
Aunty Violet Sheridan implored those who hold up half the sky to "imagine into existence" their dreams for making the world a better place.
Ms Egerton thanked the Ngunnawal Elder for her welcome to country.
She said she was inspired to take up Aunty Violet's challenge when confronted with the waste in the clothing industry and the prices paid by people in remote communities for such basic necessities as towels.
"On the first day that we launched the OpShop an elder women looked into my eyes, she grabbed my arm and she said 'life is hard in remote communities and things like this don't happen here,'" Ms Egerton said in her acceptance speech.
"Well, I'm here to tell you that it did."
In a country that produces wool and cotton exported around the globe, Australians are the world's second-largest consumers of clothes, mostly fast fashion that goes out of style fast and quickly fouls up the environment.
Over 200,000 tonnes of textiles end up in landfills every year, so Ms Egerton founded her Remote OpShop Project to bring surplus household goods to remote communities and empower Indigenous peoples living there.
"The Remote OpShop project is more than just a social enterprise. It is a movement that draws on the resilience and strength of First Nations communities, especially the strength of First Nations women."
The $20,000-prize money from the national award and the $15,000 grant from winning the territory award will contribute to the creation of a reuse hub in Darwin that will be announced in a few days, Ms Egerton said.
"We plan to open regional hubs in Cairns, Alice Springs and Broome reaching over 120 remote communities, 65,000 people in remote Australia and redirecting thousands of tonnes of excess goods destined for landfill," she told AAP.
Victorian paediatric care nurse, Grace Larson, was awarded the National Runner Up title for her work in relieving health inequalities faced by children in rural areas through The Sisterhood Project.
