Over here in Europe the situation is not too different from Australia. My gear is all covered through my home insurance (from Axa), but I had to raise the insured sum, so that it will also cover my gear, which I might bring along, when I am travelling. I have some 15k$ of equipment insured against theft, accidents or damages, when I am out of my house and beyond 100k$, when I am at home.
The same insurance company also offers to insure photographic gear as a specific insurance for photo equipment, but that seems to work only in case you rent something or use something for a specific trip (safari or such), because it only insures listed equipment and only at time value, so if you leave this insurance running for some years, your old equipment will not be replaced with new equipment, while your insurance rate will stay up, but in case of claims they will calculate how much value your equipment has lost, so it is not better than a normal insurance and in addition, if you buy new equipment, your insurance rate will go up, if you add it to the list of equipment or it will not be insured.
Please be careful with those options. For me the combination with home insurance works fine, although I must admit that my yearly rates are similar to purchasing a small L lens per year.