Dealing with governance, strategic planning and social dimension of wildfire risk management
Session: Fire prevention and preparedness
Presenter: Eduard Plana Bach, Marc Font, Marta Serra (Forest Policy and Risk Governance, Centre de Ciència i Tecnologia Forestal de Catalunya / Forest Sciences and Technology Center of Catalonia)
Contact email: eduard.plana@ctfc.cat
CTFC is a R+D institution on forestry, contributing to the modernization and competitiveness of the forest sector, the rural development and to the sustainable management and conservation of forest resources and environ. The Department of Forest Policy and Risk Governance deals with topics related to forest and society interface, where wildfire risk management from a socio-environmental and policy-making process perspectives has a relevant position.
Link: www.ctfc.cat
ABSTRACT: Cross-sectoral R+D approach under disaster risk reduction schemes is developed. Main following topics are considered: Structured diagnosis of wildfire risk and multi-hazards interactions: Risk perception and communication: Cost-effectiveness assessment of risk reduction strategies: Participatory approaches and risk governance models and Strategic risk planning and integration of wildfire risk in spatial/urban planning.
Since tendency of wildfires impacting on population, goods and services is being increased due to land use changes and climate change, updated operational tools, risk assessment procedures and organisational models towards integrated prevention-preparedness-response approach become necessary.
On that sense, most operational challenges identified to face risk changing context suggest that the correct understanding of practitioners' demands, their effective integration into R+D and multi-disciplinarily approaches are required. New hazardous scenarios of wildfires make also the understanding of the societal and policymaking dimension of risk management a crucial issue to ensure effective mainstreaming of R+D results. On that sense, platforms promoting science-practitioners interface, knowldege and lessons learned capitalization, and networking among disciplines and fields of expertise can offer significant advantages.
