Raising the Bar
A guide for the Business Council of Australia members to support the growth of Indigenous businesses.
The Business Council of Australia is deeply committed to the economic empowerment of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. The BCA recognises Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the traditional custodians of the lands and waters of Australia. Theirs is a history, a peoples, cultures, and legacy 60,000 years in the making, that today remains vibrant and strong.
Positive and practical initiatives
To help deliver national prosperity for all Australians, the Business Council of Australia is committed to positive and practical on-the-ground initiatives that support Indigenous businesses to expand, innovate, hire more workers, and create vibrant ecosystems in their communities. We believe this is a critical way of helping deliver economic empowerment.
Key pillars for our Raising the Bar initiative.
Advocacy
Advocacy at both Commonwealth and State levels to ensure the right policy settings are in place to incentivise and recognise best practice.
Capability development
Support the capability uplift of Indigenous businesses to meet broader business trends and opportunities.
International trade and investment
Facilitate international business opportunities for capable Australian Indigenous companies, and to provide support to such companies to achieve their international business goals.
Raising the Bar initiative developed in partnership with Supply Nation, Australia’s leading database of verified Indigenous businesses.
The Raising the Bar initiative (RTB) is specifically designed to support the Business Council of Australia (BCA) members to increase their procurement of goods and services from Indigenous small business suppliers. The initiative, which began in 2019, requires signatories to steadily increase their spend with Indigenous businesses to achieve targets that are set over a five-year period.
The recent 5-year anniversary of RTB highlighted ongoing efforts to increase procurement of goods and services from Indigenous business suppliers with the initial $3 billion target exceeded, 12-months ahead of schedule. As of 30 June 2025, the total spend with Supply Nation verified Indigenous businesses stood at an impressive $7.8 billion. As a result, we have now set ourselves an ambitious target of $16 billion in spend by 2030.
This has required raising awareness, shifting corporate procurement practices, and creating pathways for Indigenous business into the future in the Australian economy.
The success of the first five years has resulted in the BCA signing an update MoU with Supply Nation to continue to strive for a thriving and growing Indigenous business sector.
This MoU reflects ambitions to forge new links and strengthen existing links as we recognise Indigenous social and economic inclusion is critical to national prosperity.
Learn more about the Raising the Bar Playbook
BCA members have worked with us to develop the Raising the Bar Playbook which is designed to make it easier and clearer to report on member activity to support the growth of Indigenous businesses.
