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MainDB: Community-based fire management in Australia

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Title

Community-based fire management in Australia

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NWPTypeOfOrganization

National/public entity

NWPGeographicRegion

Pacific/Oceania

Scope of work

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Good practices and lessons learned

The outcomes achieved by the West Arnhem Fire project have potential application across fire-prone tropical Australia and other fire-prone savannas of the tropics. Fire management provides co-benefits, including climate change mitigation and economic benefits through employment. However, it requires repeated annual implementation in order to be successful.

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Date of submission

Abbreviation

Activities

The project works with indigenous fire managers to reduce unmanaged wildfires across an area of 28,000 km2. Fire management includes early dry-season burning that breaks up the landscape and makes it more difficult for wildfires to spread across the fire breaks later in the year.

Adaptation element

Adaptation planning and practices; Capacity building

Adaptation sector/theme

Agriculture; Ecosystems; Biodiversity; Ecosystem-based adaptation

Climate hazard

Country

Australia

NWPDataSource

EbA

Description

West Arnhem Land is a remote, tropical savanna region in Australia’s Northern Territory. Wildfires play an important role in the management of the ecosystem, although uncontrolled wildfires are a risk to adjacent land managers and globally significant rock art sites, and can threaten ecosystems, overwhelming their adaptive defences. Climate change impacts are expected to increase the size, intensity, and frequency of wildfires in Australia, and extend the fire season. The intervention involves prescribed fire management to avoid seasonally occurring disastrous wildfires, in partnership with the local Aboriginal people who manage parts of Arnhem Land in this way, resulting in a low incidence of devastating wildfires.

Expected outcome

Further information

Submitted by, or prepared in conjunction with the Northern Territory Government in Australia, in partnership with others. Relevant URLs: https://researchers.cdu.edu.au/en/publications/the-western-arnhem-land-fire-abatement-walfa-project-the-institut

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Indicators of achievement

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Case study

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NWPPartner

Northern Territory Government, Australia

Purpose

Regional group

Target group

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Limiting wildfires in this way prevents the degradation of different plant communities and helps conserve environmental and cultural values in Arnhem Land. Greenhouse gas emissions are also reduced as studies have shown that early dry season fires emit less greenhouse gases per area affected than the more intense, late dry season fires. A partnership with the owners of a nearby Liquefied Natural Gas plant provides around US$1 million to the Aboriginal Traditional Owners of Western Arnhem Land to implement the annual prescribed burning, to offset an estimated 100,000 tonnes of CO2-equivalent per year.

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Type of knowledge resource

Scale of work

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NWPReferences

ProAct Network 2008. The Role of Environmental Management and eco-engineering in Disaster Risk Reduction and Climate Change Adaptation: https://www.unisdr.org/files/4148_em.report.annex1.pdf

Colls, A., Ash, N. and Ikkala, N (2009). Ecosystem-based Adaptation: a natural response to climate change. Gland, Switzerland: IUCN: https://www.iucn.org/content/ecosystem-based-adaptation-a-natural-response-climate-change

Implementing partners

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Attachments

Content Type: NWPSearchableItem