Australia Exposed: Exposure Information for ensuring Australia's community safety

Australia is a country of diverse communities and environments. At any time of the year, it is possible to have simultaneous bushfires raging in the west, widespread flooding in the east and tropical cyclones threatening landfall in the north. These natural disasters have a significant impact on Australia’s communities, economy and the environment. Although we cannot prevent natural disasters, having a better understanding of the exposure to these events can inform more effective prevention, preparedness, response and recovery (PPRR) decision-making across all levels of government. Exposure refers to the elements at risk from or natural and man-made hazard events. Knowing who and what is at risk is imperative for the role of Emergency Management Australia (EMA), within the Attorney General’s Department, to administer the Australian Government's financial assistance for response and recovery during major natural hazard events. Lacking spatial expertise, EMA commissioned Geoscience Australia (GA) to enhance their event reporting with improved situational awareness mapping. The aim was to support their decision-making process with innovative, timely and efficient access to fundamental nationally-consistent spatial data and disaster event information. GA addressed this requirement by designing an Exposure Report – a streamlined yet detailed snapshot of exposure information for any area of interest across Australia. The Exposure Report is generated by consolidating a range of national fundamental datasets to extract relevant attributes and present the information in a timely, concise and easily accessible report. The automated process quickly aggregates information for a variety of standard administrative boundaries or hazard-specific footprints. It includes important exposure information such as estimated population and demographic indicators, buildings, business and infrastructure asset counts, reconstruction costs, and identifies agricultural areas, commodities and their value. The customised report provides the information EMA requires in a way that can be readily accessed and interpreted to make timely and informed emergency management decisions. The request and delivery of the report are also integrated into EMA’s incident management system to simplify the coordination, access and accountability between government departments. GA has enhanced the Australian Government’s ability to prioritise response and recovery assistance by improving the access to detailed exposure information in a timely manner. EMA now has ready access to consistent baseline exposure information for any area across Australia, leading to not only better-informed response and recovery but also to planning, preparedness and mitigation initiatives to build more resilient communities.