If you work in a Commonwealth agency and need a film, a photo series or a podcast made, you can often buy it directly from a First Nations business with a simple quote. The rules are simpler than they look. What usually decides how smoothly a job runs is the brief.
We're Ripple Narratives, a majority Aboriginal-owned production company on Darkinjung Country on the Central Coast of NSW, registered with Supply Nation. We hold a federal government production contract, and our work for health and community services runs from hospitals on the Central Coast to a legal service in remote Jigalong and an Aboriginal health service in Port Hedland. This guide is what we'd tell a comms or procurement officer before their first project with a First Nations supplier, whether that's us or someone else.
Setting up an interview for Pilbara Community Legal Service, Jigalong, 2025. Photo: Ripple Narratives
How direct buying works
Two parts of the Commonwealth rules do most of the work.
Exemption 16 of the Commonwealth Procurement Rules lets a buyer purchase directly from an Indigenous small or medium enterprise, for a contract of any size or value. You still have to show value for money, but a simple quote process can do that. An SME here means fewer than 200 full-time equivalent staff.
The Indigenous Procurement Policy then sets when you must look at Indigenous businesses first. For contracts valued between $80,000 and $200,000, and for contracts delivered mostly in remote areas, you must give an Indigenous SME the chance to quote before going to the open market. At a minimum, that means searching Supply Nation's Indigenous Business Direct. If a business there offers value for money, the contract goes to them. If not, you record the search and carry on as normal.
For many video and photography jobs, that can mean a short quote from one supplier you've checked, in place of a full open tender.
The policy applies to non-corporate Commonwealth entities. Corporate entities and state agencies are encouraged to follow it, and most states run their own Aboriginal procurement policies, including NSW.
What changed on 1 July 2026
The Commonwealth tightened who counts as an Indigenous business. Under the new criteria, a business must be 51% or more First Nations owned and controlled, or registered with the Office of the Registrar of Indigenous Corporations. Before, 50% ownership was enough.
There is a transition. Through the 2026-27 financial year, businesses meeting either the old test or the new one can access the policy. NIAA is appointing a new verification provider; once it starts, businesses verified under the old test have 12 months to meet the new one. Supply Nation keeps running Indigenous Business Direct in the meantime.
The Commonwealth target also rose. From 1 July 2026, agencies aim to award 3.25% of contract value to First Nations businesses, rising 0.25% a year to 4% by 2030 (Minister for Indigenous Australians, 1 July 2026).
What this means in practice: check a supplier's listing on Indigenous Business Direct, and ask how they meet the ownership and control test. Supply Nation lists two levels. Registered businesses are at least 50% Indigenous owned. Certified businesses are 51% or more Indigenous owned, managed and controlled.
Ripple Narratives is Supply Nation Registered, and we're working toward Certified status ahead of the new criteria taking full effect.
Exemption 16
Buy directly from an Indigenous SME, at any contract value.
$80,000 to $200,000
Contracts in this range, and remote contracts, go to Indigenous SMEs first.
51%
First Nations owned and controlled: the test from 1 July 2026.
3.25%
The Commonwealth target from 1 July 2026, rising to 4% by 2030.
What to ask any production supplier
These are the questions we'd want a buyer to ask us. Any supplier you trust should answer them without hesitation.
How do you work with First Nations people, culture and Country? Look for named protocols. Screen Australia's Pathways & Protocols and Creative Australia's protocols for First Nations cultural and intellectual property are the standard references.
How do you get consent, and what does it cover? Ask who decides who appears, how people agree, whose consent forms are used, and whether that agreement covers every place the material will run.
How do you choose and check participants? Agencies often expect the supplier to find, screen and background-check talent, then put them forward for approval.
Who owns what gets made? Many agency contracts give the agency ownership of everything created. Agree early whether the supplier can show the work in its portfolio, and how any existing material such as music or archive footage is licensed.
Who will be on site, and do they hold Working with Children Checks where the setting needs them? A small crew often matters more than a big one in a clinic, a care home, a community or a classroom.
How will you manage safety? Health, aged care and remote shoots usually need a work health and safety plan approved before filming starts.
Will any work be subcontracted, and are the subcontractors Indigenous-owned? Under the Indigenous Procurement Policy, agencies can take Indigenous subcontractors and staff into account.
What will you deliver, and in what formats? We deliver 4K masters at 25fps, with HD versions for the web, plus whatever aspect ratios, captioned versions and file naming the brief sets.
Can you supply your ABN, insurance certificates and referees for similar work? Agencies will need them before a contract.
Behind the camera in Jigalong. A small crew matters in a community. Photo: Ripple Narratives
Making it work with a small supplier
Most First Nations businesses are small. In Supply Nation's 2024-25 figures, small and medium businesses received 90% of members' spend with Indigenous suppliers. Supply Nation's 2026 Pathways to Partnership research, based on interviews with suppliers and buyers, points to habits that help:
Talk to suppliers before the tender opens, so they can plan for it.
Be clear about how likely the work is to go ahead, and when.
Match the paperwork to the size and risk of the job.
Explain invoicing, variations and reporting at the start.
Allow enough time to respond. A seven-day window shuts out people who are already on a shoot.
For a large scope, think about giving a new supplier a defined share of the work while the relationship grows.
Supply Nation's figures also show creative services and media production are underrepresented in Indigenous procurement. A video or photography job is a straightforward place to start.
What a good brief covers
The most useful government brief we've worked from ran to many pages. Every section answered a question we'd otherwise have had to ask, so a long brief is fine. What matters is that it covers these:
What the work should change: more people enquiring about a service, say, or a program being taken up. Goals written this way give both sides something to check the edit against.
The deliverables in a table: each item, its purpose, and the exact outputs, including how many films, how long, how many cut-downs and how many photographs.
Formats from day one: aspect ratios (16:9 for web, 4:5 for social), captioned and uncaptioned versions, file types, high- and low-resolution images. Accessible versions take extra time in the edit, so they belong in the quote.
Who the audience is and what they should do next. Watch the video, read the post, follow the link or QR code, land on a page. Knowing the end frame (logo, link, QR code) early means it gets designed in.
Key messages, in the words your team will use.
Style, including what to avoid. Plain lines such as "show people with agency, being supported rather than cared for" or "no staged emotion" tell a crew more than a list of adjectives.
Reference images, including some that are nearly right with a note on why they miss: the wrong setting, too posed, too clinical.
Who appears and who approves them: how participants will be found, who signs off on them, and whether your agency supplies the consent forms.
Where filming happens, whose Country it is, and whether someone from your team will be on site or on call.
Where the material will be used and for how long: web, social, print, events, presentations. This sets the licence and the wording of the consent forms.
The process: when shoot plans are due for approval, how many rounds of feedback, how soon files are delivered after each shoot, and your file naming rules.
Fixed dates: launches, NAIDOC Week, National Reconciliation Week, the end of the financial year.
The budget. A stated budget lets each supplier propose the best version of the work for that amount, and saves a round of quotes that miss.
If First Nations people may appear, say so in the brief and allow time for the right people to be asked first. Asking a community or a Traditional Owner group takes weeks, and it's far easier to plan for at the start than to add once dates are set.
Karijini National Park, 2025. Photo: Ripple Narratives
Our 2025 Pilbara trip covered 11 days and more than 4,000 km, much of it on unsealed road, including interviews for Pilbara Community Legal Service in Jigalong. Filming in Karijini National Park on that trip needed approval from three Traditional Owner corporations before the park licence was issued, and those approvals took three weeks. Knowing the locations and the people early is what made that schedule possible.
Talk to us
If you have a project coming up, or a tender about to close, talk to us early. Email hello@ripplenarratives.com or call Luke Gemmill on 0401 214 812. Our Supply Nation listing, ABN and insurance details are ready whenever your procurement team needs them, and you can see the work we've made for government and health.
Luke Gemmill and Scott Lahiff in Jigalong.