Building the Disaster Resilience of the Australian Community Services Sector
ACOSS has received a grant under the National Emergency Management Projects (NEMP) program. This program is a component of the Disaster Resilience Australia Package, which funds emergency management projects of national significance. Projects carried under NEMP support the implementation of the National Strategy for Disaster Resilience, including measures to strengthen communities, individuals, business and institutions to minimise the adverse effects of disasters on Australia. The projects are designed to improve the ability to prevent, prepare, respond to and recover from disasters across social, economic, environmental and governance elements.
The ACOSS project comprises three major outputs:
- A Disaster Resilience and Response Program for CSOs;
- A streamlined benchmarking and performance measurement system; and
- Interactive online disaster risk and resilience registers.
The first two outputs will be delivered via the development and pilot of a Disaster Resilience and Response Program and Benchmarking System for the Australian Community Services Sector (the Program), which will be piloted in four diverse sites across the country:
- South Western Sydney (NSW)
- North-West Victoria
- Adelaide (SA)
- The Pilbara (WA)
The Program will include:
- A package of all-hazards disaster resilience tools, which are designed to meet the specific needs of community service organisations (CSOs), including: a risk assessment tool; a business continuity planning tool; a set of CSO resilience indicators; and a simple, streamlined online benchmarking system, to enable CSOs to plot their progress towards greater disaster resilience;
- Three training packages designed to support organisations to use and implement these tools via face-to-face, interactive online and self-education formats; and
- A ‘train-the-trainer’ workshop designed to support community sector workers to deliver disaster resilience information and training to clients who may be at heightened risk from disasters.
The Disaster Resilience and Response Program and Benchmarking System will be piloted in three of the sites listed above, with each site piloting one of the training package delivery methods (i.e. face-to-face, interactive webinar or self-education). The fourth site will pilot the ‘train-the-trainer’ workshop.