Establishment of Early Warning Systems in the EU

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Establishment of Early Warning Systems in the EU
Seminar on Strenghtning Cooperation with
Candidate Countries and Western Balkan Countries
in the Field of Civil Protection

• Carlos Mendes
• Portuguese National Authority for Civil
  Protection
• 25 FEB 2008

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• Main topics
• Background
• State of the art in the EU
• Recent activities on Early Warning Systems
• Principles for further work

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• Early warning system is the provision of timely
  and effective information, through identified
  institutions, that allows individuals exposed to
  a hazard to take action to avoid or reduce their
  risk and prepare for effective response
• (International Strategy for Disaster Reduction)

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• The World Conference on Disaster Reduction
  (Kobe, January 2005) identified early warning
  systems as a key factor for building the
  resilience of nations and communities to
  disasters.
• In fact, early warning systems can significantly
  reduce the costs of disasters, both in terms of
  human life and property.

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State of the art in the EU

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• All EU countries have a national strategy for
  risk assessment and early warning.
• Each country is however different, because
• - Hazards are different volcanoes, earthquakes
  and tsunamis are important in the south wind
  storms in the north floods are a common hazard.
• - Responsibility lies at different levels
  central, regional, even local (municipality). In
  some cases the region has a completely autonomous
  policy to the central authority.

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• Both MS and EC have undertaken significant
  efforts to establish EWS to protect their
  citizens. Most hazards are covered by EWS.

Ex Floods - EFAS Wind storms - Meteoalarm Forest
fires - EFFIS Earthquakes - EMSC Radiological
emergencies - ECURIE
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Preliminary gap analysis revealed specific
shortcomings to be addressed by MS and
appropriate EC instruments.

Ex Tsunamis Tourists Common alarm
signals Handicapped Education
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Recent activities on EWS

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• 2007 A key year
• European Commission launched a Group of Experts
  on EWS (April)
• Seminar on EWS (Portugal, July)
• Commission staff working paper on EWS (October)
• Adoption of Council Conclusions on the
  establishment and development of EWS in the EU
  and on the establishment of an EWS for tsunamis
  in the NEAM region (December)

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• Council Conclusions on EWS
• (although primarily addressed to MS, are relevant
  also for candidate countries and potential
  candidate countries in Western Balkans, in terms
  of need for bilateral/regional cooperation in the
  field of EWS)
• Encourages neighbouring Member States to
  develop close cooperation in order to facilitate
  the interoperability and the possible
  interlinkage of early warning systems for
  emergencies with cross-border effects and to
  explore ways of establishing commonly agreed
  methods of warning population in the border areas

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• Council Conclusions on EWS
• Invites the Commission to explore possibilities
  to the development and establishment of EWS by

- contributing to identification of high risk
areas - promoting real time data sharing -
upgrading IT equipment to enable more rapid
dissemination and sharing of alert messages -
exploring possibilities for the mainstreaming of
disaster risk reduction measures into its
bilateral cooperation programmes with third
countries
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• Council Conclusions on EWS
• Encourages the Commission and the Member States
  to further explore possibilities for the
  enhancement of cooperation in this field with
  third countries, in order to strengthen sharing
  of essential data and to create an alert
  dissemination network amongst civil protection
  authorities

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Principles for further work
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• Key principles
• Cross-sectoral
• Multi hazards
• Be complementary and avoid duplications
• Fit into on-going initiatives (e.g. UNESCO/IOC)
• Explore 4 different areas
• - risk assessment
• - detection
• - dissemination of alerts
• - preparedness, education and awareness raising

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A comprehensive European Multi-risk Early
Warning System will only be possible with the
involvement of neighbouring third countries in
the Western Balkan area. In order to bridge the
gap, further activities supporting bilateral
cooperation should be promoted.