In 2009, Wesfarmers was one of the first companies to adopt a Reconciliation Action Plan (RAP). We launched our eighth RAP and first ‘Elevate’ RAP (the highest level) in June 2022, joining a small but dedicated group of Australian companies and organisations deeply committed to reconciliation. 

This Elevate RAP further strengthens Wesfarmers’ strategy to commit publicly to specific, measurable and timebound actions, to drive the Group towards our vision for reconciliation. The RAP guides the Group’s Indigenous Affairs strategy and is focused on five core areas: 

• Sustainable employment – increasing the number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander team members working in our businesses 
• Career development – ensuring Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander team members access career development and progression opportunities to increase representation at all levels of the Group 
• Supplier engagement – increasing procurement from and support for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander businesses 
• Community partnerships – investing in partnerships with organisations that are focused on improving the lives of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people 
• Celebrating Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples’ cultures – by collaborating with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultural organisations, artists and communities. 

As one of Australia’s largest employers with a presence in communities across Australia and serving millions of customers every week, we have an opportunity to create a deeper sense of awareness, understanding and empathy in the wider community.  

To build the cultural competency across the organisation, Wesfarmers’ RAP includes a significant commitment to cultural awareness training (offered to Indigenous and non-Indigenous team members). During the year, more than 33,000 instances of cultural awareness training were delivered to team members. 

Indigenous employment 

Wesfarmers is committed to increasing the number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in our workforce and to support the careers of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander team members. The size, geographic spread and diverse nature of the divisions means Wesfarmers is uniquely placed to provide employment opportunities at scale to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. 

During the 2024 financial year, we were pleased to maintain proportional representation, at around 4,172 team members or 3.8 per cent of the Australian workforce identifying as Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander. This includes all full-time and part-time Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander team members and casual team members who have worked a shift within the 30-day period prior to reporting.   

Of the 4,172 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander team members employed, around 60 per cent are female.  

Career progression

Despite having employment parity between Indigenous and non-Indigenous team members, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people remain underrepresented in management and leadership positions across the Group. 

To help close this gap, in 2021, Wesfarmers partnered with the Australian Indigenous Leadership Centre to further support the career progression of Indigenous team members, through the Wesfarmers Indigenous Leadership Program (WILP).  

WILP  

Wesfarmers supports Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander leaders across the Group with practical, comprehensive and insightful learnings and experiences to develop and promote management and executive opportunities. The WILP is a cross-divisional program, giving participants the opportunity to develop broad networks and benefit from the experiences of different divisions. It enables Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander team members to secure a Certificate II or Certificate IV in Indigenous Leadership. 

In addition to this program, divisions are identifying Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander team members with leadership potential and developing them through existing or new, bespoke training programs offered at a divisional and Group level. 

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander procurement

Wesfarmers supports partnerships with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander suppliers. With our extensive supply chains, Wesfarmers recognises that increasing our spend with Indigenous suppliers can strengthen economic prosperity of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities, as well as the broader community in which they operate.

According to the University of Melbourne’s Dilin Duwa Centre for Indigenous Business Leadership’s latest Indigenous business Snapshot¹ the Indigenous business ecosystem makes an important contribution to the Australian economy, with 13,693 active and alive (trading) businesses and corporations, generating $16.1 billion in revenue, employing 116,795 people and paying $4.2 billion in wages. In terms of generated revenue, the ecosystem is around the same size as the Australian timber industry.  

The contribution of the Indigenous business ecosystem to the Australian economy and community is far greater than the sum of its economic activities. These contributions include opportunities for Indigenous employment and self-determination, intergenerational wealth generation, sharing of Indigenous knowledge, provision of culturally sensitive services to communities and trust-building within the community. 

In the 2024 financial year, we increased our spend with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander businesses to $46.8 million of which 96 per cent was with certified Supply Nation businesses. 

Through Bunnings, we awarded a second Building Outstanding Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Business (BOAB) Fund grant to the Circular Head Aboriginal Corporation (CHAC), the Traditional Owners of the Smithton region in northwest Tasmania. The grant supported the development of a liquid plant fertiliser made with native sea kelp harvested by CHAC, which became available in select Bunnings stores in May 2024.  

Community partnerships

Wesfarmers is focused on supporting organisations that deliver strong, positive social outcomes in the areas where we live and operate. We look to add value to our partner organisations and communities. Community funding is directed to projects and initiatives within our focus areas of medical research and wellbeing, education and the arts. We also endeavour to support organisations that are Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander led or have significant Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander community programs.  

During the 2024 financial year, the Wesfarmers Corporate Office invested in 13 community partnerships that focussed on Indigenous outcomes. Wesfarmers continues to support the Clontarf Foundation, which we have since 2000. Across our businesses, we currently employ around 180 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander young men who are current or recently graduated Clontarf students. 

Celebrating Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander culture

Wesfarmers has supported Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander arts and culture for more than four decades, commissioning and collecting the work of contemporary Indigenous artists for the Wesfarmers Collection of Australian Art and working in partnership with Indigenous artists and cultural organisations in Western Australia and nationally. 

During the last year, Wesfarmers’ support for First Nations arts and culture saw the world premiere of the Wesfarmers Arts commission Wundig wer Wilura – the new Noongar language opera from award-winning songwriters and storytellers, Gina William AM and Guy Ghouse for the West Australian Opera and Perth Festival. Wundig brings Noongar language, history and culture to the operatic stage in an acclaimed follow up to the duo’s first opera collaboration, Koolbardi wer Wardong, which was commissioned by Wesfarmers Arts in 2021.  

 One of three leadership projects underpinning our Elevate RAP is the exhibition Ever Present: First Peoples Art of Australia, developed in partnership with the National Gallery Australia (NGA).  

Featuring 170 works of art drawn from the collections of the NGA and Wesfarmers, Ever Present represents the breadth and diversity of First Nations art from 1890 to today, including paintings, drawings, batiks, weavings, moving image, photography, sculpture and textiles.   

Since its launch at Art Gallery of Western Australia in 2021, Ever Present has travelled to the National Gallery of Singapore, enjoyed record audiences during its presentation at Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tamaki in 2023 and has been seen by more 220,000 people. Ever Present will feature at the NGA in Canberra from September 2024 to August 2025.   

^{1 Evans, M., Polidano, C., Dahmann, S. C., Kalera, Y., Ruiz, M., Moschion, J., Blackman, M. (2024). Indigenous Business and Corporation Snapshot Study 3.0. The University of Melbourne https://fbe.unimelb.edu.au/cibl/research}