The Importance of Business Databases in Local Disaster Resilience and Recovery
This article featured in Volume 13 of Economic Development Quarterly, the official journal of Economic Development Australia.
By Hans-Karel Fros and Agathy Patsouris
Abstract
Recent bushfires across Australia have highlighted the devastating effects of climate-related disasters on human life, local businesses and industry, and regional economies. Although there was forewarning for the 2019/20 bushfires, the severity of these fires and their impacts were unprecedented, and recovery from these events will be long-term and challenging.
This article discusses the importance of developing and maintaining an integrated current business database for economic development practitioners in local government. This database will allow Council staff to engage with businesses that are likely to be impacted by an event before it occurs, and provide support to impacted businesses during and after planned or unplanned events.
The continual updating of an integrated business database can help to reduce risk prior to an event through effective communication from Council, enable Council to easily engage with businesses to provide both immediate assistance as well as long-term recovery assistance, and can also assist in building long-term resilience for businesses in preparation for future unplanned events.
A case study from recent bushfire responses in East Gippsland Shire highlights the importance of an integrated and easily operable business database for immediate recovery, as well as long-term recovery.
Introduction
The recent climate-related disasters have shown that it can be difficult to predict when we will be faced with a situation impacting our business community, and how severe the impacts will be. Across Victoria and New South Wales, bushfires destroyed properties, businesses, displaced many and in some instances, completely devastated local business operation and local economies.
In this case, there was warning of increased bushfire risk prior to the 2019/20 bushfires across Victoria and New South Wales as a result of predictions for a hot and dry summer, however the severity of the bushfire events was unprecedented. This highlights the importance of local government preparation for any situation, including risk reduction and resilience building for unplanned events, and preparation to provide effective responses to unplanned events, both during and after the event.
This article discusses the importance of keeping an up to date business database for economic development practitioners in local government to engage with impacted businesses before, during and after planned or unplanned events. Keeping an up to date business database is imperative for providing an effective immediate response to natural disasters and climate-change events, assists in business engagement for long-term recovery and rebuilding, and is essential to preparing emergency responses for businesses.
Importance of business databases for business engagement
Integrated and up to date business databases are necessary to engage with affected businesses before, during and after severe weather-related events and natural disasters. There are also many other disruptors, both positive and negative, that can impact on local businesses. Two types of events that can cause disasters and will require mitigation include planned and unplanned events. Unplanned events can include natural disasters, unforeseen road closures or transport failures, viral outbreaks and technological disasters, whereas planned events can include positive events like major festivals and events, or scheduled transport upgrades.
It is critical that Council is prepared for both planned and unplanned events through co-ordinated, targeted and ongoing engagements with local businesses. Agencies such as Red Cross highlight the importance of creating a feedback loop1 for disaster resilience and recovery, where affected parties can be easily engaged with, but also have an opportunity to provide suggestions, comment and interact with those providing aid (in this instance Local Government).
It is critical that Council is prepared for any unforeseen events by having ongoing communication between Council units. This allows Council to know which teams to assemble to assist in direct and long-term recovery, such as Economic Development, Communications, Visitor Economy and Health, teams.
Key benefits of keeping an up to date business database include the ability to:
Engage with businesses prior to a disaster, particularly when there is forewarning e.g. forecasting for hot, dry summer indicating increased risk of bushfires;
Engage with businesses after a disaster to provide immediate support and relief;
Provide long-term support businesses to build resilience to disasters;
Build a relationship between Council and local businesses; and
Know the skillsets available in your local community to assist with disaster recovery, rebuilding and community support.
Preparing for unplanned events by building a robust business database
There are a number of steps that can be taken to ensure business databases are up to date and user-friendly for all Council units in preparation for unplanned events.
All data sources and information should be integrated into a single business database, before an unplanned event occurs. An effective and operable business database will include full details of business and relevant contacts, and will be easily accessible to all staff members within Council.
Ongoing communication with local businesses is extremely important to preparing for a disaster and building resilience within the business community to unplanned events. Targeted engagement with specific business categories, such as tailored information and guidelines to specific business sectors, will enable businesses to feel supported and prepared for unplanned events.
Details that can assist in a disaster response effort can include accommodation provider details such as number of beds and rooms to house those displaced in an emergency and classification of businesses into a specific ‘natural disaster recovery’ category to easily engage the services of relevant businesses.
Using a business database in the short-term aftermath of an unplanned event:
Start communications shortly after the unplanned event occurs. This will mitigate unrest and insecurity amongst local businesses, and will help to improve local sentiment.
Send targeted and ongoing information updates to affected businesses. Provide assistance to businesses by providing immediate updates on the status of disaster recover (e.g. status of electricity fixing). This should include general updates for all impacted businesses, as well as targeted engagement with vulnerable businesses, such as businesses producing flammable goods in a bushfire risk zone.
Use your business database to directly target businesses that have expertise in key areas of recovery. These may include logging companies to help clear bush, medical practitioners for assistance with medical outbreaks, or transportation companies to move passengers from a broken down train to accommodation businesses. Utilising the skills of local businesses is an effective way to keep money in the local economy, as well as fostering a sense of community and responsibility amongst local businesses.
Using a business database for long term recovery and ongoing engagement
Monitoring the progress of businesses over a longer period after a disaster is crucial to their recovery. Local government needs to be prepared for a disaster by preparing a defined, multiphase recovery strategy.
It is important for local businesses to know that Council is aware of their situation and is providing them with assistance. Sending out a survey after a disaster has occurred is far less effective than being in contact with businesses when they are in need during the event and in the period following.
Phase 1: Triage of businesses impacted:
Identify the impacted businesses using your business database. Identify impacted businesses by location and business classification, for example agriculture businesses are more likely to be impacted by a bushfire than some other business types. An interactive map of businesses is particularly useful in the instance of a natural disaster, as Council is able to identify businesses directly affected by the event.
Classify the impact of the event on the businesses using a clearly defined rating scale. This can be a scale of severe, moderate and low impact, with criteria for each relating to impact on business operation, revenue and physical damage to the business or property.
Identify the immediate actions that can be undertaken. This includes immediate relief for businesses in terms of emergency needs, funding and support programs.
Phase 2: Reference to recovery assistance agencies and programs
A critical aspect of recovery is knowing what services, programs and funding is available to impacted businesses, and being able to efficiently direct impacted businesses to appropriate recovery assistance.
This means knowing which services are available to assist businesses and keeping a consolidated database that can be accessed by all members of Council. In a time of crisis, individual roles within an organisation can be blurred, and it is likely that Council staff will be required to assist with areas outside their unit of expertise, therefore it is critical all recovery assistance information is available to all teams.
Once businesses have been directed to the referred services, track the referral in your business database.
Phase 3: Follow the journey of the impacted businesses during their recovery
Council should monitor the journey of businesses over the recovery period to understand the long-term impact on business activity and operation, and to provide assistance and support where possible.
Using the business database, Council should engage with businesses directly and update their recovery status by calling or visiting. It is important to record engagements in the business database, to track the recovery of business and to also ensure Council is providing the necessary support to businesses.
This stage is key to understanding local business sentiment and building a long-term relationship between Council and businesses.
Phase 4: Report and learn
The reporting phase is critical to understand the impact of the disaster to the business community and to provide learnings for more effective mitigation of future risks and disasters.
Report regularly on the activities undertaken by the Economic Development unit in business recovery, as well as the activities undertaken by referred services and programs to assist businesses. Internal reporting should also be conducted regularly to identify business sentiment and which businesses might need greater levels of engagement than others.
The recovery process will take place over many years and other challenges will face the businesses over time. Recording the recovery process from each event will help staff in Council’s economic development role in future, by knowing what affected the business in the past and using that information to better assist the businesses.
Case Study: East Gippsland Bushfires
East Gippsland Shire was severely affected by the 2019/20 bushfire disaster. When the bushfire event occurred in the Shire during December 2019-January 2020, the Shire had the following tools:
Destination Gippsland database;
Current business members database;
Accommodation capacity audit 2019;
Email newsletter subscriber database;
Bushfire survey database;
Marketing subscriber database; and
Australian Business Register (ABR) data.
Although Council had the necessary data available, there was no efficient or direct means for Council to contact businesses in their Shire, as the data was located across a range of datasets and only available to selected personnel in Council.
East Gippsland Shire Council was considering Monitor CRMS for their economic development business database for early 2020. The bushfire tragedy over the holiday period made it evident that the delivery of Monitor CRMS was imperative to engage with businesses and had to be accelerated.
Urban Enterprise was able to deploy a complete business database within a week, to support the start of recovery efforts across the Shire. By combining all data and resources into a single database within Monitor CRMS, the team was able to significantly increase the reach of each business unit. This includes Economic Development, Business Marketing, Tourism and the recovery teams.
The East Gippsland team began by contacting the affected businesses, and Urban Enterprise recently provided training, followed by a consultancy session on how to best leverage Monitor CRMS to manage the restoration process.
East Gippsland is now able to effectively target and monitor their entire business community over the recovery period, and report on the progress of restoration. Council is already preparing for possible upcoming disasters and will be able to swiftly and adequately respond, without losing valuable time gathering and compiling data.
Based on a follow-up consultation session with Council, a case management tab has been developed in Monitor CRMS, which allows Council to update and monitor the status of business recovery during each step of the process. The addition of this function means Council is now able to effectively generate business recovery progress and engagement reports in a single location.
Monitor CRMS is deployed for the overall registration and tracking of businesses, contacts, engagements, events and communications. Some examples of how Monitor CRMS is leveraged to assist the response to major events includes:
Bass Coast - Coronavirus impact on Phillip Island businesses (2020). Bass Coast Shire is using Monitor CRMS to engage with affected businesses to mitigate the impact of significant tourism reduction on Phillip Island due to the Coronavirus outbreak.
Hume City Council - Grass Fires (Ongoing). After ongoing grass fire impacts, Council decided to implement Monitor CRMS to easily provide accurate contact details to emergency services. Businesses can now be informed of any future incidents immediately.
Hobsons Bay Council - Altona Tyre Fires (2016). During a large fire in the Hobsons Bay municipality, Monitor CRMS was used to inform the affected businesses to take appropriate measures.
Latrobe Valley Authority – Closure of Hazelwood Power Station (2017). Use Monitor CRMS to track engagements to deal with the aftermath of the Hazelwood Power plant closure. Even though this it is not classified as a disaster, for the area the impact is similar to impact of a disaster.
Hans-Karel Fros and Agathy Patsouris