Senate inquiry highlights SEI's role in disaster resilience
The Senate Inquiry, Boots on the ground: Raising resilience, assesses the nation’s preparedness for increasingly frequent and severe natural disasters. It has drawn attention to several key recommendations from SEI's submission, particularly those from the Self-organising Systems and Animals in Bushfires projects.
The Inquiry was established in response to growing concerns about Australia’s ability to cope with natural disasters, exacerbated by climate change. The report examines the current state of disaster resilience across the country, evaluating the effectiveness of existing policies and proposing new strategies to enhance preparedness and recovery efforts.
SEI's submission to the inquiry was a collaborative effort between the Self-organising Systems and the Animals in Bushfires projects. The submission addressed critical issues such as the integration of social and environmental justice into disaster resilience frameworks, the role of community engagement, and the importance of considering non-human lives in disaster planning.
The SEI submission was cited multiple times throughout the report, emphasising the importance of the following recommendations:
- Self-organising systems to minimise future disaster risk: The breakdown of formal disaster response and recovery mechanisms inhibited the efficient allocation of state-controlled resources and the effective use of community efforts. Failures in physical infrastructure, such as roads, telecommunications, and electricity networks, further exacerbated these institutional shortcomings.
- Improving coordination: The report recommends that governments consider integrating community knowledge, networks, and strategies to enhance the effectiveness of conventional disaster response and recovery efforts, including firefighting, sandbagging, evacuations, and the distribution of supplies.
SEI remains committed to advancing research and advocacy in this area, continuing its work on projects like Self-organising Systems and Animals in Bushfires. SEI looks forward to collaborating with government agencies, communities, and other stakeholders to implement the report’s recommendations and contribute to a more resilient Australia.
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