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Down in Australia, Blue Mountains residents, business owners, managers and employees are being invited to participate in a survey to better understand the current structures of local business community groups and networks from a perspective of disaster preparedness, resilience and shared values.

This initiative is being led by Faculty Affiliate, Professor Daniel Aldrich alongside Katoomba-based Associate Professor,Valerie Ingham, who lectures in emergency management at Charles Sturt University in Bathurst, are driving the survey with corporate2community Director, Renae Hanvin.

The survey is funded under the Bushfire Community Recovery and Resilience Fund (BCRRF) project through the joint Commonwealth/State Disaster Recovery Funding Arrangements – focused on building resilience across the local business community.

Professor Aldrich believes that “Communities that are tightly connected fare much better during a major disaster than communities where people don’t even know each other.” The survey aims to provide insights as to how businesses have been interacting with each other, and how involved these businesses are with their local communities in New South Wales, Australia in a bid to understand how to further build a stronger, more connected business community across the region in the face of another natural disaster.