Emergency Management in Australia

Australian Emergency Management Institute

The Australian Emergency Management Institute (AEMI) is a centre of excellence for knowledge and skills development in the national emergency management sector. AEMI provides a range of education, training, professional development, information, research and community awareness services to the nation and our region. To find out more, visit the AEMI page.

Schools Education and Disaster Resilience

Emergency services personel and school children attend a course

The schools education program supports the learning and teaching of disaster preparedness and risk reduction to enhance community resilience to the effects of disasters. The program provides a range of publications, videos and interactive learning games for students, teachers and the general public.

Visit the Emergency Management for Schools website.

This website provides the key online access point for emergency management information from the Australian Government. The Australian Government Minister responsible for Commonwealth Emergency Management is the Attorney-General. The site provides information about Australian and regional emergency management, in a national security context, including content on policy formulation, national emergency operations and development of national and international capability. For more information visit Our organisation.

Australian assistance to Pakistan following floods

On behalf of all Australians, the Australian Government has contributed $35 million and provided a medical task force to support the United Nations and the Pakistani Government's flood response. The international disaster aid plan AUSASSISTPLAN has been activated, which involves the Incident Management Facility of Emergency Management Australia (EMA), a division of the Attorney-General’s Department, coordinating arrangements for a 20-person civilian medical team to operate at Kot Addu near Multan in the Punjab Province. The team leader is an experienced emergency manager from EMA and the medical personnel are drawn from across Australia. For more information, visit the AusAID website.

The Australian Emergency Management Institute welcomes new Executive Director

The Secretary of the Attorney-General’s Department, Roger Wilkins, recently visited the Australian Emergency Management Institute (AEMI) in Mt Macedon to welcome incoming Executive Director, Raelene Thompson.

During his remarks, Mr Wilkins commented on the central role that capacity building plays in national security, adding that AEMI’s elements of education and training, community and international engagement, and research and development, are fundamental to this goal. He indicated that collaboration across the arms and agencies of government and reaching out to partners in the wider community are key, affirming that AEMI is well placed as a hub and clearing house to assist in this.

The Secretary was presented with updates on new AEMI products including the Beyond Command and Control - New Leadership for New Crises course, the newly published Guidelines for the Development of Community Education, Awareness and Engagement Programs in the Australian Emergency Manual series, and forward development of the disaster resilience for Australian schools program.

2009 Victorian Bushfires Royal Commission Final Report

Read the 2009 Victorian Bushfires Royal Commission Final Report on the 2009 Victorian Bushfires Royal Commission website.

Triple Zero (000)

Knowing how to call Triple Zero (000) in an emergency can be the difference between life and death. The Triple Zero (000) service is the quickest way to get the right emergency service to help you. It should be used to contact Police, Fire or Ambulance services in life threatening or emergency situations. Calls to Triple Zero (000) are free and can be made from mobile, home and work telephones, and payphones. For more information, visit the Triple Zero (000) page.

All-hazards approach to disaster funding

Attorney-General, Robert McClelland has announced that the Australian Government will extend the Natural Disaster Relief and Recovery Arrangements (NDRRA) to include terrorist events as well as natural disasters. For more, read the media release.

Preparing kids for disasters and emergencies

The Attorney-General, Robert McClelland, and Federal Member for Eden-Monaro, Mike Kelly, have launched new education materials to help school students better understand and prepare for natural disasters and emergencies. For more, read the media release.

$3.6 Million for emergency management projects

The Attorney-General, Robert McClelland, has announced the Government will invest $3.6 million to assist Australian communities respond to and recover from natural disasters and emergencies. For more information about these national projects, visit the media release and the National Emergency Management Projects page.

2010 National Bushfire Arson Forum

Attorney-General, Robert McClelland, and Minister for Home Affairs, Brendan O’Connor, have announced new initiatives to combat deliberately lit fires as part of the second annual ‘National Forum for the Prevention of Bushfire Arson’. For more, read the 2010 National Bushfire Arson Forum media release.

Volunteers National Photographic Competition 2010

The Attorney-General’s Department presents the winning entries from the Volunteers National Emergency Management Photographic Competition 2010 on the Photo competition page.

Council of Australian Governments Communiqu�

The Council of Australian Governments (COAG) met in Brisbane on 7 December 2009 and agreed to a range of measures to improve Australia’s natural disaster arrangements. Given the expected increase to the regularity and severity of natural disasters, COAG agreed to a new whole-of-nation ‘resilience’ based approach to natural disaster policy and programs. This program recognises that a disaster resilient community is one that works together to understand and manage the risks that it confronts. To find out more, visit the COAG website and see pp. 13-14 and Attachment C pp. 22-23 of the Communiqu�.

National Broadcast of Emergency Warnings

The objective of the National Broadcast of Emergency Warnings project is to improve the effectiveness, clarity and consistency of arrangements between all broadcast media, and all emergency management organisations, for the request and broadcast of emergency public warnings. As part of the project, the 'Emergency Warnings - Choosing Your Words' guide was produced as a resource for use by emergency management agencies and broadcasters. For more information and to read this guide, visit the National Broadcast of Emergency Warnings website.

Natural Disaster Resilience Program

From 2009-2010, Commonwealth funding for disaster mitigation works and support for emergency management will be approximately $110 million over four years. The new Natural Disaster Resilience Program (NDRP) will consolidate a number of current funding programs.

Learn more about the Natural Disaster Resilience Program.

Upcoming events

For details of national and international emergency management related conferences and workshops, visit the Conference list page.

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