John O’Donnell

The Australian Treasurer Jim Chalmers recently released a 6,000 word essay, ‘Capitalism after the crises‘, where he states:

“I see a dreadful symmetry between the global financial crisis and Black Saturday, in the way each overwhelmed our rational capacities to explain and grasp what was happening – not just our individual comprehension, but our collective understanding.

… The new advice learnt from that period has saved many lives since, including during the Black Summer fires of 2019–20

.… Being a good policymaker begins with having the right information and mental models for how the world works

….Our mission is to redefine and reform our economy and institutions in ways that make our people and communities more resilient, and our society and democracy stronger as well.“

The Treasurer’s essay opens up an opportunity to discuss whether Australia has in fact learnt and implemented lessons from the Black Saturday bushfires and ways to improve economic and management outcomes for Australia in relation to bushfires.

My first comment is regarding lessons from the 2009 Victorian bushfires, which is well covered in a 2021 Quadrant article by Peter Rutherford, “The learning impaired managers of bushfire risk”. In that article, Peter notes that,

“the 2009 Black Saturday bushfires in Victoria cost 173 human lives, destroyed more than 2,000 homes and caused immeasurable environmental damage across 450,000 hectares.

… Recommendation 56 of the 2009 Victorian Bushfires Royal Commission Final Report stated: The State fund and commit to implementing a long-term program of prescribed burning based on an annual rolling target of 5 percent minimum of public land.” 

However, this Victorian prescribed burning program has been reduced to a much lower level using a residual risk approach, as outlined in the article.  The consequent impacts of the 2019/ 20 bushfires and other bushfires in Victoria are also highlighted.

It is apparent that key lessons in regards to prescribed burning and bushfire policies aren’t being adequately captured and retained and certainly bushfire management hasn’t changed for the better over recent timeframes.

My next comment relates to the failure to address high fuel loads across southern Australia forested landscapes and resultant ongoing major bushfires and major economic impacts.  The 2019/ 20 bushfires burnt over 17 million hectares and were also very costly, estimated by AccuWeather to be $110 billion in terms of total damage and economic loss.

The cost estimate is based on an analysis incorporating independent methods to evaluate all direct and indirect impacts of the fires based on a variety of sources.  Still, the disaster costs are huge.  Addressing these high fuel loads across landscapes would markedly reduce disaster costs, the cost of lost infrastructure and post disaster payments.

My third comment is that, when looking broadly at fire and bushfire management across southern Australia, matters aren’t hunky dory at all.  Inquiries and royal commissions haven’t adequately addressed the key issues such as prescribed burning and fuel load reduction across landscapes, nor at community interfaces.  A very good assessment on this is outlined in Roger Underwood’s 2020 article, “The Utter Failure of yet another Bushfire Panel”.

This, in my view, brilliant article exposed what is wrong with current bushfire management across southern Australia, follow up panels established after bushfires and the main factors behind the 2019/ 20 bushfires.  As Roger noted, “Bushfire management in Australia must be based on preparedness and damage mitigation”.

My fourth comment relates to the large numbers of Australian communities and firefighters that are not adequately protected from bushfires.  This is evident from the extent of bushfires, lost lives, and the impacts on large numbers of communities, towns and cities, infrastructure, firefighters, forests and fauna.

I’d suggest that approaches being used in the USA in relation to fire adapted communities, Firewise, local fire safe councils, the Ready, Set, Go! Program, improved funding to reduce fuel loads, undertaking prescribed burning, forest thinning and community involvement in fire management all need to be considered for Australia.

My fifth comment relates to the economic, community and safety opportunities associated with current fire and bushfire management, across the spectrum of mitigation, prevention, suppression and recovery. 

As outlined in my earlier article, “Opportunities for economic reform within fire management across South East Australia”, there are many fire management economic reform opportunities across the spectrum of mitigation, prevention, suppression and recovery.

There are also opportunities to undertake thorough bushfire investigation and publicly release details of all major bushfires. This is important across Australia. 

Consider the recent US bill (now law) H.R. 7077 – Empowering the U.S. Fire Administration Act. This law “authorizes the U.S. Fire Administration (USFA) to conduct on-site fire safety investigations of major fires and other fires under other specified circumstances.” 

Common sense decisions and management at this time can reduce the costs and impacts of future bushfire disasters.

Conclusions

There is inadequate bushfire mitigation and funding across southern Australia, this includes prescribed burning and other fuel management measures.  There are large government expenditure savings to be made through increasing mitigation expenditure to reduce bushfire natural disaster costs and response costs. 

In my opinion, current bushfire management and policies have many failures and there is not currently a good base to put together budgets and improve economic management. 

However, addressing the major required reform areas and associated opportunities associated with bushfire management would result in improved budget bottom lines, productivity and reduced bushfire impacts on communities, infrastructure, forests and the environment. It is important to establish the right disaster policies, strategies, cooperative approaches, culture, funding arrangements, market approaches and private sector involvement.

There are many opportunities for economic reform of bushfire management across southern Australia and this is essential considering the huge ongoing impacts of disastrous bushfires. 

The importance of early and effective mitigation applies to flood disasters also.

Listening to bushfire experts and skilled on the ground bushfire managers hasn’t been great at times. Nor have there been adequate arrangements for the review and public release of lessons learnt after major bushfires.

Review of the bushfire sector can’t be left to budget time. It needs to be carried out by people with the rights skill sets and expertise.

About John O’Donnell

John is a retired district forester and environmental manager for hydro-electric construction and road construction projects.   His main interests are mild maintenance burning of forests, trying to change the culture of massive fuel loads in our forests setting up large bushfires, establishing healthy and safe landscapes, fire fighter safety, as well as town and city bushfire safety.