How are people currently responding to climate disasters?

Australia has seen plenty of climate related disasters in recent years. Most recently during the past year, floods in Qld, NSW, Vic, SA and Tasmania have been very damaging and costly to communities across the country.

Before the floods, we saw widespread bushfires during the summers of 2019/20 (mainland Australia) and 2018/19 (Tasmania), which motivated a Government investigation into how Australia can improve its National Natural Disaster Arrangements. The outcomes of that report states ‘Australia’s disaster outlook is alarming, with climate change exacerbating bushfires, extreme rainfall and flooding’.

‘Responding to climate disasters’ requires action in many ways.

• We should seek to prevent disasters. This would include activities like removing or reducing the population that live in areas that are exposed to climate hazards like floods or bushfires.
• We should be well prepared for disasters. This would include activities like having accurate early warning systems, that initiate action to minimise impacts in the immediate lead-in of a hazard event.
• We would be well positioned to respond during an event. During the time of crisis, we should have the resources to assist people in need and minimise harm.
• We should be able to support communities to recover after an event. After a disaster has struck, it takes a lot of time and effort for a community to recover to what it was beforehand. Ideally, we should aim to recover to be better prepared for future events (build back better).

Currently, almost all of the money spent on disasters is during the event (responding) or after (recovering). We should aim to be better prepared in the first instance, to minimise any damage happening at all.

Responding to the climate crisis needs us to both

1. reduce our emissions as fast as possible (e.g., the emphasis on emissions reduction and targets for net-zero), AND
2. invest early in climate change adaptation and/or disaster mitigation (e.g., steps to minimise the adverse impacts of foreseeable hazards, by reducing the exposure and/or vulnerability to those hazards), to manage the climate change impacts already committed.

Further reading:

Natural Disaster Commission Report