Source: European Parliament
1. According to the EU Treaties[1] Member States are primarily responsible for the management of disasters[2], including forest fires. The Commission supports coordination and complements Member State actions through the Union Civil Protection Mechanism[3] and its early warning tools, including the Copernicus’ European Forest Fire Information System (EFISS)[4]. The Commission also encourages the use of the Galileo Emergency Satellite Warning Service and supports the development and maintenance of Member States response capabilities to wildfires through rescEU[5] and the European Civil Protection Pool[6]. The Commission encourages the share of best practices in prevention and preparedness with a variety of tools[7][8].
2. As announced by the President of the European Commission in the Political Guidelines 2024-2029, the Commission intends to put forward a Quality Jobs Roadmap, developed together with the social partners to support fair wages and good working conditions for all EU workers, including those in the public safety sector.
3. Advanced technologies used in EFISS, and the European Flood Alert System[9] play a key role in the detection and response to potential disasters. The Commission also encourages the use of advanced technologies in this field through multiple instruments, such as the Track 1 technical assistance and the Knowledge for Action in Prevention & Preparedness (KAPP)[10] grants as well as the Horizon Europe[11] programme including its disaster risk reduction activities[12] and the EU Mission: Adaptation to Climate Change area[13].
- [1] Article 196 TEU https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/HTML/?uri=OJ:C:2016:202:FULL
- [2] Whether natural or man-made.
- [3] https://civil-protection-humanitarian-aid.ec.europa.eu/what/civil-protection/eu-civil-protection-mechanism_en
- [4] https://forest-fire.emergency.copernicus.eu/
- [5] https://commission.europa.eu/funding-tenders/find-funding/eu-funding-programmes/union-civil-protection-mechanism-resceu_en
- [6] https://civil-protection-humanitarian-aid.ec.europa.eu/what/civil-protection/european-civil-protection-pool_en#:~:text=The%20EU%20established%20the%20European%20Civil%20Protection%20Pool,European%20response%20to%20human-induced%20disasters%20and%20natural%20hazards.
- [7] Including pre-positioning of fire-fighters during fire seasons, advisory missions, and peer reviews of their national disaster management systems, including of Italy’s, published in January 2025 (https://civil-protection-knowledge-network.europa.eu/stories/italy-ucpm-wildfire-peer-review-final-report-published-and-handed-over)
- [8] Furthermore, the European Regional Development Fund National Programme for Security for Legality 2021 — 2027 in Italy includes a project on smart forest environmental monitoring of EUR 30 Million. This involves the development and deployment of a system to collect, manage, integrate and correlate environmental monitoring data, together with automatic alert mechanisms to support a network for the control and verification of criminal activities in forest, rural and peripheral areas of cities. The aim is to provide the Forestry, Environmental and Agri-food Unit Command of the Carabinieri with adequate control tools for data and information to strengthen legality and combat environmental crime.
- [9] https://www.copernicus.eu/en/european-flood-alert-system
- [10] https://civil-protection-knowledge-network.europa.eu/knowledge-action-prevention-preparedness-2024
- [11] https://research-and-innovation.ec.europa.eu/funding/funding-opportunities/funding-programmes-and-open-calls/horizon-europe_en
- [12] https://research-and-innovation.ec.europa.eu/funding/funding-opportunities/funding-programmes-and-open-calls/horizon-europe/cluster-3-civil-security-society_en
- [13] https://research-and-innovation.ec.europa.eu/funding/funding-opportunities/funding-programmes-and-open-calls/horizon-europe/eu-missions-horizon-europe/adaptation-climate-change_en