The Insurance Council of Australia (ICA) says it is continuing to work with governments on mitigation priorities identified through the analysis of hazard and premium data.

But Head of Risk and Operations Karl Sullivan, writing on LinkedIn, warns it is crucial that planning processes, especially environmental impact assessments, “are robustly undertaken”.

“Mitigation efforts such as levees and dams, to reduce the impacts of flooding on a community, must take into consideration the impacts that would occur upstream,” he says.

“Fortunately, governments have established planning processes that require an assessment of these impacts to be made, so those issues can be balanced against community benefits that may be achieved downstream from the flood mitigation.

“It can be complicated.”

Mr Sullivan says the insurance industry welcomes opportunities to help “with this complicated but necessary process” by using its specialist knowledge to help calculate economic benefits for communities.

“Our knowledge is available to be used by governments which need to balance all considerations for the proposal including feasibility, sustainability and environmental issues.”

ICA has put together a report on mitigation priorities that can be accessed here.