Australia’s recent natural disasters reveal a persistent gap in disaster governance: environmental values are inconsistently integrated, and ecosystem disasters are often overlooked. The South Australian algal bloom, which caused extensive ecological and economic impacts, highlights how ecosystem disasters are typically not legally recognised as disasters, leaving response, recovery, and funding mechanisms untriggered. The NDRR Framework defines a disaster as: ‘A serious disruption of the functioning of a community or a society at any scale due to hazardous events interacting with conditions of exposure, vulnerability and capacity, leading to human, material, economic or environmental losses and impacts’; leaving out the disruption to natural systems themselves.
The National Climate Risk Assessment identified the current climate risk to the Natural environment system as high to very high and that impacts are significant, widespread, and cascading across all systems. The National Adaptation Plan goes on to highlight that the Natural environment system supports and provides services to all other systems, and ecosystem transformation or collapse will also result in a loss of nature’s benefits to people (i.e. ecosystem services) whilst losing its ability to stabilise the global carbon cycle.
The Colvin Review (October 2024) recommended significant improvements to Australia's disaster arrangements, including increased long-term investment in resilience and betterment. Restoring and extending natural systems at a landscape-scale using nature-based solutions presents an opportunity to strengthen the resilience of our communities, businesses, and landscapes, if they are also managed appropriately to ensure they do not degrade under increased pressures.
This interactive workshop will convene researchers, policymakers, practitioners, and community representatives to explore a central question: How can environmental considerations be systematically embedded in Australia’s disaster management frameworks, and aligned with national resilience and climate adaptation priorities, weaving together ‘nature for nature’ and ‘nature for people’ objectives.
