State of affairs in relation to preparation for major bushfires across Australia’s forests, communities and infrastructure
John O’Donnell
It is the author’s belief that Australia is not adequately prepared for upcoming bushfires. To be frank, we as a society have learnt very little following 2019/20, especially in regards to bushfire mitigation. Communities, firefighters and the ecosystems are highly exposed over the coming El Nino period and a lot of bushfire skills have been lost. Disaster and insurance costs are going up every year and will continue to go up with current adapted approaches.
There are ten main areas of concern in relation to bushfire preparation for major bushfires, outlined below.
Number 1 is inadequate prescribed burning and consequent high fuel loads across forested landscapes across South East Australia; this will not protect the South East Australian states. For example, New South Wales is currently sitting on 3.3 per cent of forested areas prescribed burnt over 5 years, of the order of 0.7 per cent per year.
Refer to the state prescribed burning and wildfire data in this article: https://arr.news/2022/05/18/review-of-prescribed-burning-and-wildfire-burning-across-australia-john-odonnell/
Number 2 concerns inadequate resilient landscapes and ecological maintenance burning across SE Australia; eucalypt decline in our forests is rapidly increasing, increasing bushfire risk greatly with dense forest understories (combined with dense regrowth resulting from intense bushfires).
Australia is not adequately considering nor using US approaches for resilient fire landscapes, including low intensity burning and forest thinning.
Number 3 relates to the focus on bushfire suppression and big plane fleets at the expense of fire mitigation. There are large economic costs of this approach. This issue has been well identified by the Productivity Commission a number of times and not adequately addressed by government.
Number 4 pertains to an inadequate fire mitigation funding balance, noting that there is further disaster funding detail in 2020 Menzies Research Centre Strengthening Resilience: Managing natural disasters after the 2019-20 bushfire season:
“Despite this relentless commitment to inquiries, in 2014, a report released by the Productivity Commission into Natural Disaster Funding Arrangements found that government natural disaster funding arrangements had been inefficient, inequitable and unsustainable …
“The Productivity Commission lamented that the funding mix was disproportionately recovery-based and did not promote mitigation. It observed that the political incentives for mitigation were weak, ‘since mitigation provides public benefits that accrue over a long-time horizon,’ and that over time this would create entitlement dependency and undermines individual responsibility for natural disaster risk management.’
“At that time, it said, mitigation funding amounted to only three per cent of what is spent on post-disaster recovery and recommended that the Australian Government should gradually increase the amount of annual mitigation funding it provides to state and territory governments to $200 million.”
Extra funding has since been provided, but it is uncertain what changes have occurred in relation to fire mitigation funding.
Number 5 includes inadequate fire fighter safety and access, with many forests dangerous for fire fighters, poor access, not maintained access, adjacent high fuel loads, ridges not prescribed burnt nor access tracks, breaks not burnt and adequate water supplies not available.
Number 6 concerns communities/ infrastructure and properties which continue to be at major risk. I believe that we as a society haven’t learnt the lessons of 2019/ 20 and earlier bushfires such as those in 2003 and 2009. There is inadequate prescribed burning, grazing and thinning around many communities, schools, infrastructure and other areas. The ongoing risks and potential impact of bushfires on communities, critical infrastructure and properties for South East Australia remains extremely high, likely less for South West Australia and much of Northern Australia.
Number 7 relates to bushfire risk management plans that are often generic, cover very large areas and are not focussed on individual towns or cities and often involve low community participation.
Number 8 relates to inadequate understanding and addressing of all the contributory factors to the 2019/ 20 bushfires.
Number 9 pertains to the fact that there has been inadequate mitigation performance auditing of state bushfire planning, mitigation and suppression in some state jurisdictions, increasing bushfire risks.
Finally Number 10 relates to research directions not being adequately targeted at increased bushfire mitigation (including prescribed burning), sensible fire return intervals, forest resilience, eucalypt decline and increased bushfire risks, reducing high intensity bushfires, community safety and firefighter safety and research on individual large bushfires.
At times there is a focus on reducing prescribed burning to miniscule and inadequate rates and denigrating prescribed burning, without adequate consideration of whole of landscape, community, fire fighter safety and intense bushfire risks.
The National Emergency Management Agency convened a two-day National Preparedness Summit in Canberra from 25 to 26 September 2023 for nominated invitees, I understand 250 invitees. It is unclear how each of these ten main areas of concern in relation to bushfire preparation for major bushfires were considered, but on media information available, the ten matters have either been considered in minor detail, or not at all, with bushfire preparation the responsibility of each state or territory.
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.
