Boost to National Park fire management

In another 12 June pre-budget announcement (see previous post), and in further response to the NSW Bushfire Inquiry, the NSW Government committed $598 million over 10 years to the National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS) to “bolster firefighting capabilities, improve radio networks and enhance the protection of significant habitats like the world-famous Wollemi pines”.

The money also funds 200 permanent national park firefighters and 50 conservation staff. The firefighters were previously temporary, and the conservation staff will give effect to the government’s earlier move to declare and protect “assets of intergenerational significance” (AIS) as a part of bushfire management.

IBG Comment

• This announcement recognises some important issues: that critical environmental assets deserve protection during bushfires, that land management agencies are crucial actors in bushfire management and that NPWS in particular manages most of the bushfire-prone bushland in NSW. The Rural Fire Service (RFS) is not a land manager but works cooperatively with government and private land owners to achieve bushfire outcomes.
• IBG has long stressed the importance of rapid suppression of remote fires and has argued for more resources to support this objective and related capacities such as aerial attack and off-road suppression. Most of the large fires of Black Summer began as remote lighting strikes in national parks and other bushland, some of which could have been put out early with different strategies and appropriate resources.
• These issues were a focus of IBG’s major report and submission to the NSW Bushfire Inquiry, Reducing the Costs and Impacts of Bushfires. The report highlighted an imbalance, where Remote Area Fire (RAF) operations have been under-valued and under-resourced compared to road-based capacity, ie. trucks, with tragic consequences. For managing wildfires in large bushland areas, this imbalance is akin to funding lots of ambulances while failing to adequately support doctors.
• Because of the areas it manages, NPWS specialises in RAF and has the largest capacity in NSW (eg. 1200 firefighters, paid and mostly RAF-capable), and together with partner agencies such as RFS, a strong record of putting fires out when small (eg. at least 14 remote lightning strikes put out at a size of less than 4 hectares in Blue Mountains national parks during Black Summer) and also applying successful control strategies away from truck access (eg. see IBG Fire Case Studies 6 and 10). IBG commends that this funding boost will augment and expand these vital capabilities, especially the number of RAF firefighters. But more is needed.
• As for protecting AIS, IBG has previously noted the difficulty of achieving this in wildfire scenarios (see IBG Post below of September 10, 2021). It is to be hoped that the provision of dedicated staff will help break down barriers in research, planning, knowledge and attitude.
• $598 million is a lot of money. ‘Throwing money at a problem’ is often criticised, when the main barriers to progress can be policy, institutional, inertia and attitudes. Funding can be wasted, so monitoring, reporting and vigilance are required to ensure that real outcomes are actually achieved by such significant investments.