And shrinking workforce

landowners can be engaged in these important activities to ensure the best possible overall outcomes.

The small amount of funding allocated by the Government over recent years is a good start — and most welcome. However, in reality, it is nowhere near enough to manage the risks that are increasing as land in public ownership expands and fuel loads worsen.

Our urban cousins need to understand the importance of controlled burns as a tool in fire preparedness. Yes, there will be some smoke, and perhaps even some minor inconvenience — but that’s just part of living in our beautiful landscape.

To suggest that planned and controlled fuel reduction burns are the equivalent of industrialised smog and vehicle emissions does not stand up to scrutiny in the Tasmanian context. On the contrary, summer bushfires that have high combustible fuel loads pose a much more significant risk.

Paradoxically, the people who would save our forests from the loggers, or who complain about smoke haze from fuel reduction burns, are often not those on the front line when forests are really endangered.

We saw the devastation caused by the 2013 Dunalley fires — and they could have been so much worse. I don’t have to remind you that 173 people died in the 2009 Victorian bushfires; 414 people were injured, many of them severely; 7650 individuals were displaced; more than 2000 homes were destroyed.

We all have a duty to support measures that protect the community from the ravages of bushfires and the inevitable heartache that incidents bring. We all have a duty to minimise the risk we present to ourselves and to our neighbours.

Coming together in the face of disaster is an underpinning strength of our communities. This requires a shared commitment and a shared trust — and there’s much to do before we can reach that position. Jan Davis is an agribusiness consultant and former chief executive of the Tasmanian Farmers and Graziers Association.