NAFI service's founding manager has announced his retirement from the role

Northern Australia Fire Information (NAFI) founding manager Dr Peter Jacklyn has played a pivotal part in advancing our understanding of fire in Northern Australia. 

He has managed NAFI since its inception in 2003. 

Together with Chris Devonport and Ian Franzen, Dr Jacklyn developed NAFI for the Tropical Savannas Cooperative Research Centre. 

NAFI is a web service based at Charles Darwin University (CDU). It is the only fire information service that provides satellite-based maps and tools for land managers across most of Australia. The service is used by pastoralists, Indigenous ranger groups, government agencies, researchers, and communities across Australia to monitor and manage fires. 

NAFI data covers 80 per cent of Australia. The website is estimated to have more than 200,000 users who access data year-round.  NASA data shows that between 2001 and 2023, 99.3 per cent of all fires in Australia occurred across the NAFI coverage region. 

Reflecting on his almost quarter of a century of experience with fire monitoring, Dr Jacklyn said that the key to managing bushfires in Northern Australia was managing the land, and a key tool in managing land was fire.  

“In Northern Australia, if you can manage the country, then you can actually make a difference not just for the country, but also to protect the communities that are embedded in those landscapes,” Dr Jacklyn said. 

“Fire mitigation is more connected with managing land than it is down south, where it's much more about controlling fire to prevent the destruction of houses and saving lives.  

“Up here, NAFI is used to monitor broad, landscape-scale fires that the satellites can pick out. We serve people in rural and remote areas, helping them protect their land.” 

Looking back on his time developing NAFI, Dr Jacklyn said the service had far exceeded his expectations.  

What was thought to be a limited government-funded experiment quickly became an in-demand resource for fire information for Northern Australian communities. 

“Once the Cooperative Research Centre ended, the funding for NAFI dried up and the trouble was nobody volunteered to pay for it to continue,” he said. 

“We couldn't get any money for it. So, we just put a note saying, 'shutting down'.” 

“Then people began calling on the ministers to continue to finance NAFI, and ever since the funding has really been driven by the users. It was clear that our work was something many relied on for fire management.” 

While Dr Jacklyn is stepping down from his role as NAFI Manager, he will continue to be a part of NAFI in an advisory capacity. He will also continue to work on a book on fire management in collaboration with practitioners and researchers.  

“The book will be an updated version of the original Savanna Burning book published in 2001. It’ll be an information resource for fire management in northern and remote Australia with lots of pictures.

"It’ll showcase how fire in these areas is different to what it is down south.”