The Sporting Shooters' Association of Australia was established in 1948 to promote the shooting sports and protect firearm owners' interests in Australia. The SSAA currently claims a membership of over 186,000, making it the largest body representing licensed firearm owners in Australia, with interests covering all aspects of recreational shooting and hunting, including firearms collecting and youth education. The SSAA also participates in the ongoing debates on government firearms policies.
Structure
The SSAA is organised at the bottom level as local sporting clubs, around locations and/or speciality shooting disciplines or conservation activities. Members may be unaffiliated with a club, or members of one or more clubs. Clubs are organised in branches, where each club sends two voting delegates to the branch AGM. A state may have one or more branches according to the population and size of membership. State level executive teams deal with state level sporting management and legislative issues, and elect the SSAA National Executive Board. SSAA states it is independent of any political party and supports politicians who support recreational shooting and hunting while condemning those that work against its members' interests.
Activities
The SSAA at the club and branch level has many thousands of volunteers and officials running competitions and managing facilities of their clubs for all levels of competition. The SSAA manages more than 16 handgun, rifle and shotgun shooting competitions at the local, state, national and international levels, as well as having several branches devoted to historic and collectible firearms. The SSAA also comprises an insurance arm, SSAA Insurance BrokersPty Ltd, which provides general insurance for the majority of major shooting organisations within Australia, as well as public liability insurance for SSAA members while shooting or hunting.
Publications
The SSAA publishes a range of publications, including the monthly Australian Shooter, quarterly Australian Hunter, annual Australian & New Zealand Handgun, biannual The Junior Shooter, SSAA's Comprehensive Guide to Shooting & Hunting in Australia, Shooting and the SSAA - A Beginner's Guide, A Journalist's Guide to Firearms and the Shooting Sports, ASJ: The political voice of the SSAA, the SSAA National E-newsletter, Field to Fork - The Australian Game Cookbook, and more.
Revenue
The national branch of the SSAA collects $10 million in annual fees.
