What motivates people in small rural communities to become ...

Executive summary
This research aimed to find out about what motivates people to join and remain a member of
the Volunteer Rural Fire Forces (VRFF) in New Zealand. The research was conducted
through a literature review, a survey of 354 volunteer fire fighters in 10 Regional Fire
Authorities (RFAs) across New Zealand and case studies in seven rural fire forces.
Why volunteer?
The literature on volunteering shows that generally people volunteer for altruistic reasons to
give back to their community or protect their community; for social reasons because they like
the social contact and the sense of belonging; and for personal reasons in that it is either of
personal interest to them or for personal development. This holds for those who volunteer in
fire and emergency services with the addition that they like the added excitement and
challenge that comes with volunteering in this sector. Volunteers in the VRFF give up their
time to recruit others, train, practise, fundraise, maintain equipment and attend call outs. For
most of them this is an addition to their everyday working lives.
Why join the VRFF?
In the survey all the volunteers said they joined because they wanted to ‘contribute to their
community’ with almost all saying they also wanted to ‘protect people and property’. These
reasons were closely followed by ‘knew someone in force’ and ‘gain new knowledge and
skills’. Respondents were least likely to be motivated by thinking they could ‘educate others’
or that joining the VRFF would help them with their career. Of interest in these findings is
that 91% said that knowing someone was a motivator for joining. This is in keeping with
other findings that people joined because of family or being shoulder-tapped by current
members.
My husband and myself are the only original members still active after 30+ years and
our adult children are members now. Farm owners change. The local forestry camp
is closed. Someone needs to do it for our community.
There are motivational differences by age and gender for joining the VRFF. Notably, people
in older age groups are less likely to be motivated by, ‘physical challenge’ ‘personal
development’, ‘excitement’ and ‘career development’. Or put another way, people in the
youngest age group have stronger personal motivations than the older age group. Women
are less motivated than men by ‘interest in fighting fires’, ‘excitement and challenge’ and in
being able to ‘educate others’. This latter point is the most marked, with only 39% of women
as opposed to 65% of men saying this was a motivating factor.
While there are motivational differences between the volunteers in the North and South
Islands this is likely to have been influenced by age as the respondents in the South Island
are, on average, younger than those in the North Island. Three factors that motivate South
Islanders more than North Islanders are also those that motivate those in the younger age
groups namely, ‘physical challenge’ ‘personal development’ and ‘excitement’. Rurality,
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