1 year after the bushfires, Australia is picking up the pieces

Meanwhile in Australia, one year after the massive bushfires, the country continues to heal its wounds...

Transcript

00:00Australian bushfires showed the world a future that no one wants.

00:09Tragically, 34 people lost their lives and just over 3,000 homes were destroyed in the

00:13bushfires.

00:14By the time that bushfire event had finished, we had lost some 17 million hectares of land

00:21and an estimated 1 billion native animals had perished.

00:38We have a bit better of an idea of the losses they caused to our natural environment.

00:41An estimated 3 billion animals were killed or displaced and up to 7 billion trees were

00:45destroyed or damaged.

00:47Many of our forests have started to regenerate, but it's still going to take decades for them

00:51to recover.

00:52Bear was able to locate over 120 koalas, 30 of those were brought into various wildlife

01:12rescue and rehab centres and treated and were able to be released.

01:33It's a really alarming number.

01:35Many important koala populations were directly on the path of these fires.

01:39In New South Wales, for example, where koala numbers were already declining, it's estimated

01:43that about 8,000 koalas were killed or displaced, which is a devastating blow for koalas in

01:48New South Wales.

01:49This makes it more important now than ever for us to protect surviving koala populations

01:54and their remaining habitat.

02:22We've worked extensively with wildlife care groups and carers on their planning and particularly

02:29evacuation planning and training for these sorts of events.

02:42We need to reduce our contributions to global emissions and climate change by switching

02:47to economies based on renewable energy.

02:49Here in Australia, WWF has launched a bold plan to regenerate Australia.

02:53We're going to work with partners to rehabilitate, repopulate and restore wildlife habitats,

02:58boost sustainable agriculture and to help future-proof Australia against climate disasters.