Now is the time for property owners to be making sure their fire plans are ready.
That was one of the key messages to come out of a cross border fire meeting held at District 24 headquarters in Wodonga on Tuesday.
The meeting featured around 30 representatives from a various fire and emergency service organisations, including CFA, DELWP and NSW Rural Fire Service.
CFA Regional Commander Paul King said that with fire danger periods already declared, it is up to property owners to be making sure they know their plan in the event of a fire.
"All those things you can do now, you can't do when a fire's occurring," he said.
"By clearing up around you house, moving things that are around your house, removing fuels - they are the things you need to do now.
"You can't do that at the time of a fire."
King said the meeting was highly beneficial, with another planned for early next year.
Among the talking points were communications, planning, aviation, first strike and ongoing strike team response, and general incident management experiences.
Half of Victorians living in high fire danger areas underestimate the risk posed to their homes, as per research released by CFA.
A dry winter has the whole of the state on notice ahead of the summer, with Fire Danger Periods declared for most of Victoria. Regionally the West, South and East Gippsland, East metro and Hume regions are most likely to experience an above average bushfire season.
Click here for more information on preparing for fire.