Integrating scientific knowledge into bushfire risk mitigation in southwest Victoria, Australia

In order to provide insight into the integration of scientific knowledge into bushfire risk mitigation, this paper considers the findings of a case study of bushfire practitioners in the Barwon-Otway area of southwest Victoria. This region has recently been the site of multi-agency efforts to reduce the residual bushfire risk. 

Scientific knowledge and scientific uncertainties play a significant role in the mitigation of natural hazard risk. As such, the natural hazards sector is often represented as 'science-led' or 'research-led'. However, in actuality, relationships between scientific research, policy and practice are neither simple nor linear, and there are presently few studies that focus on the layers of practitioners who find themselves mediating these relationships. The paper concludes by posing several questions relevant to this and other risk mitigation contexts.

Australian Journal of Emergency Management, Volume 31, Issue 2, January 2016, Pages 13-17. This document is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.