Suncorp Group and the Foundation for Rural & Regional Renewal (FRRR) have opened applications for a $600,000 grant round to fund disaster recovery and resilience projects in remote, rural, and regional Australia. The latest Rebuilding Futures round, funded by Suncorp and administered by FRRR, is open to community groups and not-for-profit organisations in areas affected by declared natural disasters or extreme weather between 2019 and 2025. The program provides funding for locally led initiatives that address ongoing disaster impacts on community wellbeing and infrastructure, and that seek to strengthen preparedness and risk reduction ahead of future events.
The 2026 Rebuilding Futures round is structured into two streams, each with $300,000 available. Eligible applicants can seek grants of up to $25,000 per project. The Disaster Resilient Communities stream is open to remote, rural, or regional communities that appear in a government disaster declaration issued between January 2019 and December 2025. The Disaster Recovery Support stream is limited to Queensland communities affected by Tropical Cyclone Alfred between March 1 and 16, 2025, or by the Western Queensland Trough, which led to widespread rainfall and flooding across Western Queensland from March 21 to May 19, 2025. Projects must either directly support community recovery following a declared disaster or strengthen local capability to prevent, prepare for, or manage future events. The design aligns with sector-wide efforts to integrate mitigation and resilience into broader disaster management strategies alongside claims handling and risk transfer.
Lisa Harrison, Suncorp chief executive consumer insurance, said the program’s delivery model aims to work through organisations with established local roles. “Because every community recovers differently, we are proud to back grassroots groups that have their fingers on the pulse of local needs. Accessing help isn’t always straightforward. That’s why we value our collaboration with FRRR, working together to ensure this funding lands exactly where it can do the most good. These organisations do the heavy lifting to prepare their communities for the future and, together, we are committed to helping them build back stronger and stay ready for whatever the next season brings,” Harrison said.
FRRR program manager Danielle Griffin said communities are at different points in the recovery and preparedness cycle after multiple years of severe weather and disaster activity. “Over the last six years, the experience of severe disaster and climate related disruption has increased across remote, rural, and regional Australia. This grant program provides funding opportunities for the critical medium to long-term period, when immediate relief and response support is no longer available but communities are ready to rebuild community assets, address social issues related to the disaster, or have learnings to apply to future prevention and preparedness. We recognise that many communities have been impacted on multiple occasions and are vulnerable to future risks. We want to support projects informed by local decision making that can strengthen resilience with practical resources, social connection, infrastructure that’s built back better and better systems,” Griffin said.
Applications must demonstrate alignment with at least one of seven dimensions of community resilience identified by FRRR in partnership with the University of Sydney: inclusion, networks, communication, information, self‑organising systems, local decision making, and resources. This criteria set highlights how community grant programs are being linked to specific resilience indicators rather than general notions of recovery. Funded initiatives may include upgrades to community facilities, investment in communication and coordination systems, or programs that build social capital and local governance capacity. From a risk perspective, such initiatives have potential to influence disaster readiness and post‑event recovery timeframes in hazard‑exposed areas, with flow‑on implications for claim outcomes and business interruption.
Suncorp’s latest Rebuilding Futures round is part of a broader pattern of Australian insurers developing structured grant programs that operate at community level, alongside policyholder support and hardship measures. By 2025, only a small number of insurers had formal disaster‑recovery grant schemes focused on communities rather than individual claimants. Suncorp, RACQ, and NRMA Insurance are among those that have adopted this approach, each with different delivery partners and program designs.
In 2025, Suncorp’s earlier Rebuilding Futures round made $400,000 available to disaster‑affected remote, rural, and regional communities. That round included smaller grants for local recovery and preparedness projects and larger allocations for upgrades to critical community infrastructure intended to withstand future events. Funding outcomes announced in June 2025 directed more than $300,000 to initiatives such as training, equipment purchases, infrastructure works, and specialist building‑resilience advice.
In Queensland, RACQ provides most of its community disaster funding through the RACQ Foundation, which runs standing community‑grant programs that expand after major events. After Tropical Cyclone Alfred and associated flooding in March 2025, RACQ committed $1 million for affected families and community organisations, including up to $500,000 in RACQ Foundation Recovery Grants for clubs, charities, First Nations councils, and other groups in disaster‑declared locations. In FY25, the Foundation’s Community Grant Program distributed $6.4 million across Queensland for recovery and resilience initiatives.
NRMA Insurance, part of IAG, entered the community grants segment in late 2025 with the NRMA Insurance Help Fund, a multi‑year initiative positioned at the intersection of climate resilience and disaster recovery. In its first year, from Oct. 1, 2025, to Sept. 30, 2026, the fund is providing $1 million in grants to climate‑ and community‑resilience projects, including an innovation stream offering $50,000 to $100,000 grants to businesses developing climate and disaster‑resilience solutions. The expanded Rebuilding Futures program illustrates the continuing development of insurer‑backed community funding as a complement to traditional underwriting and claims, particularly in regions with recurring exposure to extreme weather and natural catastrophes.
