Burn target shortfall increases 'risk'

Western Australia's bushfire fighting agency has fallen short of its controlled burning target for the South West for the 16th time in 18 years.

Despite a big increase on the past two years, the Department of Parks and Wildlife will be more than 25 per cent short of its 200,000ha target.

According to the latest figures released by the department, it had burnt just 142,334ha for the financial year, with the final figure yet to be released.

The result is an improvement on the previous year, when 78,234ha was burnt and an even bigger improvement compared to 2012/13 when just 23,468ha was burnt.

Bush Fire Front chairman Roger Underwood said every year the DPaW failed to meet its target the bushfire hazard in the South West increased.

"However, to some degree their inability to meet their target this year was offset by the horrendous bushfire in the karri forest and east of Collie," he said.

"I believe that DPaW has its heart in the right place and is genuinely trying to get the job done.

"Unfortunately they inherited the problem of years of mismanagement and they still have to face uninformed and selfish criticism from the city-based environmentalists."

Mr Underwood said the allocation of new State funding for prescribed burning in the South West was encouraging.

An extra $20 million over the next four years was set aside for prescribed burning in the region as part of the recent State Budget.

A DPaW spokeswoman said the department was confident it would meet its 2015/16 target with the addition of the Royalties for Regions funding.

"It will allow Parks and Wildlife to develop and implement an enhanced prescribed burning program for the land it manages in the South West," she said.

"It will enable the department to more readily deploy fire crews across the South West and also put in place other measures to maximise the opportunities to safely carry out prescribed burning."

She said the department relied on suitable weather to safely undertake prescribed burning - a factor that affected its 2014/15 target.