What fire management plans are in place for the next 5 years?

Its aim was to set out strategies to minimise and mitigate the risk of fire to the community over five years.

Penned by fire agencies, land managers, and other stakeholders as part of the Far South Coast Bush Fire Management Committee (BFMC), the Bush Fire Risk Management Plan (BFRMP) was now on exhibition for public comment.

Far South Coast Rural Fire Service district coordinator Chris Anderson said the plan had taken two years of work after public consultations and input from all agencies and land managers from Eurobodalla and Bega Valley Shires.

"We believe we have a really solid draft plan at the moment, and that's now out to the community for consultation and does finish at the end of the month," he said.

"We just want to hear people's thoughts of what the Bush Fire Management Committee has put together."

After assessing the risk to residential, special fire protection purposes (schools, health facilities, childcare, etc), economic, environmental and cultural assets, a number of Far South Coast suburbs stretching from Dalmeny to Eden were selected as focus areas.

These include Bermagui, Guerilla Bay, Central Tilba and Tilba Tilba, Dalmeny and Kianga, Tathra and Kalaru, Merimbula and Tura Beach, Pambula and Pambula Beach, Eden, Mt Imlay (Balawan), and the mountains of Biamanga (Mumbulla) and Gulaga.

Each risk profile analyses the suburbs, provides a brief synopsis of the town's history, the median age of residents and population numbers, and explains significant economic assets, the number of cultural assets, and the last significant bushfire event.

"The focus areas are particularly around where there is still residual risk and long runs of fires into communities where areas weren't affected by the Black Summer fires," Mr Anderson said.

"Noting that it's been five years since the fires, and there is a lot of fuel accumulation out in the bush as well."

For Tathra and Kalaru, the last significant fire event, the Reedy Swamp Fire in March 2018, impacted the townships, with the community losing 79 homes.

Although this area's residential and economic risk was moderate, it was expected to increase over the next five years as vegetation recovered from previous fire scars.

A key BFMC objective was to protect residential, commercial, environmental and cultural heritage values by implementing an integrated approach encompassing fuel management, prescribed burning, response treatments and community preparedness.

The Far South Coast draft Bush Fire Risk Management Plan has been available to view on public exhibition online at www.rfs.nsw.gov.au/plan-and-prepare/managing-bush-fire-risk

The plan can also be viewed at the following locations and online: