Of Drought and Flooding Rains: QRIDA Reflects on 30 Years of Drought and Disaster Recovery
16 September 2024
Queensland has the unpleasant title of Australia’s most natural-disaster prone state. Between wild cyclones, monsoonal rainfall events and bushfires, Queenslanders have endured some of the toughest weather events in the past 30 years.
Originally established as the Queensland Rural Adjustment Authority (QRAA) in 1994, and then being renamed to the Queensland Rural and Industry Development Authority (QRIDA) in 2017, QRIDA has played a pivotal role in supporting Queenslanders impacted by major disasters and prolonged droughts.
Sheree Finney, QRIDA Disaster and Drought Manager reflects on some of QRIDA’s historical milestones over the past three decades.
"QRIDA has been an essential support beam for Queensland communities, offering important financial assistance during difficult recovery periods.
"Since 1994, QRIDA has administered over $780 million in disaster recovery grants and over $184 million in disaster assistance loans,” she said.
"In the last 30 years, Queenslanders have experienced some of the toughest disasters and droughts; the millennium drought, Cyclone Larry in 2006, the 2010-11 Queensland Floods, the Cyclone Yasi in 2011, Cyclone Debbie in 2017, the Peregian Bushfire and North and North West Queensland Monsoon Trough in 2019, Tropical Cyclone Jasper in 2023 and the list goes on.
“Each of these events left lasting impacts on our communities, but with the help of financial assistance through QRIDA, primary producers, small businesses and non-profit organisations were able to rebuild their businesses promptly," Sheree said.
While Queensland was recently declared drought-free for the first time in 11 years, Sheree enthuses that producers should still be preparing for when drought returns.
“It was wonderful news to see Queensland declared drought-free earlier this year but now is a crucial time for producers to allow their properties to recover from previous droughts and prepare for future droughts by accessing the financial support available to fund projects that will improve the drought resilience of their properties.”
In addition to preparing for drought, there’s a strong focus on high rainfall and flood mitigation projects.
“We’re about to enter our 2024 disaster season and producers need to start thinking about preparing their property for both bushfires and flooding events because as we know, in Queensland we could experience either disaster event.
“We continue to develop programs to focus on immediate recovery but also future preparedness like our Primary Producers Flood Management Grants to improve resilience to flooding and high rainfall,” Sheree said.
For more information visit QRIDA’s current drought support and disaster recovery assistance web pages.
Pictured below: Luke Stock who accessed a disaster recovery grant through QRIDA with Manager, Disaster and Drought, Sheree Finney.
