With the very real and devasting impact of natural hazards and disasters front of mind this High-Risk Weather Season, Australian Business Volunteers (ABV) reflects on five years of driving community-led disaster and economic resilience for empowered solutions from the bottom up.
Putting communities in the driver's seat, building local capacity, and forging lasting relationships, this work has featured 175 community projects delivered across 16 disaster affected and prone local government areas in regional and remote Australia.
While ABV as international development organisation has traditionally delivered inclusive economic and sustainable development across 34 countries in the Asia-Pacific, CEO Liz Mackinlay reflects that January 2020 marked a distinct shift for the organisation to deliver services in its own backyard.
“We were watching the catastrophic impact of the Black Summer fires devastate communities across the East Coast; impacting our volunteers, our Australian-based team, and bringing out country to standstill as homes, livelihoods, habitats and lives were taken,” ABV CEO Liz Mackinlay says.
“We had communities hurting in our own backyard, and ABV had the skills to help. Lending our hand at a time of significant national disaster was simply a no brainer.”
Liz Mackinlay, ABV CEO
ABV's CEO and Program Director drove from Sydney to the heavily fire-affected town of Cobargo in New South Wales to see where and how ABV and its volunteers could be of help.
“We approached the community’s members with sensitivity and humility – after all, they were both the first responders and the long term recovery agents of change – so we wanted to make sure we grounded our offer of support in their priorities. Our deep relationships with the impacted community groups and leaders in the region allowed us to then co-design our services to support community-led organisation to build back better,” Liz says.
Since then, ABV’s team of community development professionals and skilled business volunteers have channelled over $6m in diverse funding and in-kind support to further community-led initiatives across disaster-affected and prone communities along the Eastern Seaboard.
As ABV engaged with communities across regional Australia, a clear message came through. Facing industry transitions, youth migration, workforce shortages and growing isolation, people wanted more than disaster recovery — they wanted to build stronger, more self-sustaining futures.
Through a strengths-based, community-led approach, ABV is working alongside local leaders who are determined to shape their own futures — helping them turn challenges into opportunities.
In Braidwood, ABV supported the development of a Tourism Roadmap to revitalise local industries and strengthen visitor appeal. In Orbost, we worked alongside community members to design an organisation structure that gives locals a unified voice in shaping the future of their town — based on their own priorities and aspirations.
“Communities told us they didn’t just want to recover from disasters — they wanted to build stronger, fairer local economies and a deeper sense of connection,” Liz says. “That’s what resilience truly looks like.”
As programs continue to expand to Victoria and Queensland, with a view to partnerships across all States and Territories, ABV’s evolving focus connects disaster preparedness with long-term economic resilience and social cohesion — helping communities anticipate change, adapt to new realities and thrive together.
ABV remains committed to walking alongside communities, ensuring local knowledge drives local futures.
