How Australia is Tackling Wildfire

About this episode

This episode discusses Australia's proactive approach to wildfire mitigation and contrasts it with the U.S. system.

For the last few decades, Australia has taken a proactive and centralized approach to wildfire mitigation. It's wildfire building codes are standardized and mostly mandatory throughout the country, and in some especially wildfire-prone areas the government restricts development altogether. By contrast, the U.S. has a patchwork, state by state and even town by town approach to wildfire rules and building codes. On this episode of the NFPA podcast, we talk to Maria Kornakova, the national bushfire manager at Fire Protection Association Australia, to learn more about the history of the Australian wildfire codes and the country's accreditation and mapping programs. We also chat about Australia's successes and challenges tackling the wildfire threat, the differences of the U.S. approach, and what the countries might learn from each other. LINKS Learn more about Fire Protection Association Australia Learn more about NFPA's FireWise USA program Learn more about Outthink Wildfire, NFPA's ambitious effort to eliminate wildfire loss in the U.S.

People in this episode

Guest: Maria Kornakova

Topics covered

• wildfire mitigation
• building codes
• Australia
• U.S. wildfire approach
• fire safety
• government policy

Keywords

• wildfire
• Australia
• building codes
• fire safety
• government policy
• wildfire management

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Fire Protection Association Australia, National Fire Protection Association

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