GRAMPIANS residents are urged to have their assets insured appropriately.
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New analysis shows Halls Gap, Pomonal, Mount Dryden and Mokepilly residents are the most at-risk of losing money to bushfires of anywhere in Australia.
Sydney-based natural hazards research centre, Risk Frontiers, has estimated the average annual losses on insurable assets such as homes and commercial property for every Australian postcode.
Risk Frontiers general manager Andrew Gissing said governments and companies could use the results to identify risk mitigation priorities.
He said the modelling took into account each postcode's probability of fires, where the buildings were located in relation to bushland, slopes and aspect. Mr Gissing said average annual loss was the sum of all losses, divided by the number of years simulated by the models.
Grampians Insurance Brokers principal David Hosking encouraged business owners to consider purchasing business interruption insurance.
"People tend to think, 'I have to insure my assets' - whether it's a building, motor vehicles or the contents they own," he said.
"They know they need public liability insurance, but this specifically covers loss of income when you have a significant disaster.
"We've had claims in the past 10 or 12 years from businesses operating in the Halls Gap region where they didn't suffer any physical loss but their business had to be evacuated because of fires in the area. They got paid out quite a significant amount.
"A lot of farmers don't insure their crop or livestock, which is where their money is."
Northern Grampians Shire emergency manager Warren Groves said the council worked with the Country Fire Authority and Forest Fire Management Victoria to mitigate fire risks in the Halls Gap area.
"Coming up to the declaration of the fire danger period by the CFA, municipal fire prevention officers inspect every residential area within the shire and make an assessment of the fire risk and where they meet the risk criteria," he said.
"Then notices will be issued to the properties individually. We then go out and do re-inspections within 28 days. In Halls Gap's case, a lot of properties are absentee landlords, so they just get us to organise improvement works which we charge them for."
Mr Groves said the council was involved in the long-term recovery from fires, including finding affected residents accommodation and putting them in touch with insurance brokers.
CFA District 16 commander Neville Collins said firefighters would use their ultralight tankers - which held up to 500 litres of water - to reach fires threatening isolated properties.
"They need to have their properties cleared of any debris and grass slashed," he said. "We can't guarantee we can get a fire truck to every property on a bad day, so if there is an emergency warning out people need to evacuate."
Mr Collins said firefighters would likely back-burn to stop fire spreading in mountainous terrain.
Victorian postcodes made 19 of the top 20 most at-risk spots in Risk Frontiers list, with Mount Buller in the state's north-east and Lavers Hill on the south-west coast ranking second and third respectively.
The next highest Wimmera postcode for fire risk was 3401 at number 114, which encompasses the rural areas of Horsham municipality.
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