Australian Bushfires: Useful Background Information

Hi everyone,

With a challenging week ahead facing a number of Australian states and territories from the threat of bushfire, I'm enclosing a link to our latest Disaster Risk Management (DRM) bibliography, with emphasis on bushfire-related items highlighted in yellow. Please feel free to share this info around interested colleagues and working partners, as there is some useful information here applicable to other sudden-impact disasters:
Disaster Risk Management (DRM) Selected Bibliography (Bushfires)
http://www.torqaid.com/images/stories/DRMBibliographyMasterBushfires.pdf

The items in yellow include:
   • The Victorian State Emergency Management Manual (p.4)
   • The Geer film 'Then the Wind Changed' (p.5)
   • An article by Dr Rob Gordon on psychosocial-related issues (p.6)
   • The Gov of Western Australia's 2011 Keelty report on their last major bushfires (p.6)
   • The Hawe document on community recovery following the Victorian 2009 bushfires (p.6)
   • The Muller publication on Media Ethics & Disasters (particularly relating to the 2009 Victorian bushfires) - p.9
   • A couple of articles by myself (Piper) on the diagrammatic framework used in DRM (p.10)
   • Two articles by the State Government of Victoria on both the Victorian Bushfire Royal Commission (VBRC), and psychosocial recovery framework following bushfires (p.12)
   • The Winkworth article relating to community recovery following the 2003 Canberra bushfires (p.13)
   • The Yarra Ranges Council Municipal Emergency Management Plan (MEMPs), which incorporates key lessons learnt from the 2009 Victorian bushfires

One of the key challenges to effective DRM initiatives is of course genuine engagement with the affected community. Whilst we often give lip service to this, the reality in practice (as witness some some comments coming out of Haiti) is somewhat disappointing. The link to the article below highlights key principles which we think are helpful in understanding this:
TorqAid Guiding Principles for Effective Community Development and Humanitarian Work
http://www.torqaid.com/images/stories/TorqAidCDGuidingPrinciples.pdf

Please feel free to share this material around interested parties.

Cheers

Chris

Chris Piper
Managing Director & Lead Consultant, TorqAid
PO Box 13, Torquay,
VIC 3228, Australia
Tel: + 61 (0) 412 497 317
www.torqaid.com
www.linkedin.com/companies/torqaid