Disaster Ready Fund - Round One 2023-24

The Australian Government has established the Disaster Ready Fund (DRF). The DRF will provide up to one billion dollars over the next five years, from 1 July 2023, to improve Australia’s resilience to natural hazards.

Funding for DRF Round One: 2023-24 opened on 10 January 2023 and closed on 6 March 2023. Up to $200 million in funding was available, with projects to commence from 2023-24.

Projects under DRF Round One 2023-24 could target a broad range of natural hazards, and could include:

• (Stream 1) Infrastructure projects, such as
  • investment in grey infrastructure;
  • investment in green-blue infrastructure (including nature based solutions);
  • investment in hazard monitoring infrastructure; and
  • business case development for future infrastructure (including investigation, modelling, concept and detailed design activities).
     
• (Stream 2) Systemic risk reduction projects, such as
  • supporting a better understanding of risk, through a better evidence base to understand and raise awareness of risk – to improve understanding of natural hazards and their potential impacts over time;
  • strengthening decision making by enhancing governance networks and communities of practice, including the development and/or alignment of resilience and risk reduction strategies;
  • adaptation projects that improve land use planning and development practice projects, including but not limited to the preparation of regional or local plans and updating land use planning instruments and building codes;
  • projects that build the capacity and capability of businesses, community sector organisations and/or at-risk communities to improve their preparedness and resilience to the impacts of future disasters; and
  • projects that enable and incentivise private investment in disaster risk reduction.

Applicants could partner with one another and deliver projects across multiple jurisdictions.

Key dates

Applications for Round One of the Disaster Ready Fund opened on 10 January 2023 and closed on 6 March 2023.

Important: State and territory lead agencies coordinated their own processes to identify projects. Please refer to the relevant state or territory to confirm closure dates within each jurisdiction.

Who could apply

Only Australian states and territories were eligible to apply for funding in Round One 2023-24.

States and territories were expected to work with local governments and communities to identify suitable proposals.

Each state and territory nominated a lead agency. The lead agency was considered as an Applicant and had responsibility for coordinating proposals for their jurisdiction and submitting the applications to the National Emergency Management Agency.

Lead agencies

Key documentation

• Disaster Ready Fund Guidelines: Round One, 2023-24
• Disaster Ready Fund Frequently Asked Questions: Round One, 2023-24
• Disaster Ready Fund Fact Sheet

More information

For more information, please email disaster.ready@nema.gov.au. Answers to questions received via the mailbox will be periodically published in our Frequently Asked Questions.