Women and children in East Timor will continue to suffer in poverty unless the nation is able to determine its own wealth, East Timor's first lady Australian-born Kirsty Sword Gusmao said.

Ms Sword Gusmao, who spoke at a women's conference in Melbourne, said the people who had fought so bravely for Women and children in East Timor will continue to suffer in poverty unless the nation is able to determine its own wealth, East Timor's first lady Australian-born Kirsty Sword Gusmao said.

Ms Sword Gusmao, who spoke at a women's conference in Melbourne, said the people who had fought so bravely for independence should not be made to beg for financial autonomy.

"East Timor should not be forced into the position of beggar," she said. "It's not befitting of a country and a nation of people who fought so bravely. "I think it's really important for the country as a whole to have that sense of dignity that as a sovereign nation we're able to stand on our own two feet, at least in the long term."

Her emotional plea for a better deal for the impoverished new nation followed the announcement by Foreign Minister Alexander Downer on Friday, that East Timor and Australia had struck a deal over maritime boundaries and oil and gas revenues from the Timor Sea.

Under the agreement, debate over boundaries will be put aside and East Timor will receive up to $A5 billion on top of the 90 per cent share of revenue it currently receives from the joint development area in the Timor Sea.

Ms Sword Gusmao, the wife of President Xanana Gusmao, declined to comment directly on the deal but said there must come a time when East Timor was self-determining.

She said she saw first-hand the poverty of the East Timorese people who suffer among the worst infant mortality rates and whose budget is almost exclusively funded by foreign aid.

She told the Melbourne crowd at Loreto Mandeville Hall about women who earn just $1.50 a day for sewing.

Her charity, the Alola Foundation, was established in 2001 to fight violence against women in East Timor and now works to help women through economic empowerment and education.

"I see, on a daily basis, the need that exists and as a public figure I am confronted with the challenge of trying to respond to those things," she told AAP.

"I am also frustrated because the government doesn't have the basis for meeting those needs in its own right. It is extremely dependent on external aid.

The Timor Sea Justice Campaign has welcomed this week's deal but claimed it did not reflect East Timor's full legal entitlement.

"The deal ignores the establishment of permanent maritime boundaries, that if established... would deliver most, if not all, of the Greater Sunrise field worth an estimated $50 billion in government royalties to East Timor," group spokesman Tom Clarke said.