The Science Pillar of the Knowledge Network at the 7th Civil Protection Forum
The Science Pillar was presented at the Knowledge Network booth in the Civil Protection Forum exhibition area and presented more in depth during a “Using science and data for understanding and reducing risks” workshop.
The Science Pillar booth of the UCP Knowledge Network displayed the current tools and data available through the Science & Research section of the Knowledge Network platform. The Exhibition area featured around 30 booths showing the work of national authorities, EU research projects and some industries.
The central booth was dedicated to the Union Civil Protection Knowledge Network, co-organized by DG ECHO and the JRC. A series of videos showing examples of scientific work, DRMKC books and flyers on the Risk Data Hub, and other relevant projects were featured. The booth was visited by Commissioner Lenarcic, a Minister of Luxembourg, and by the majority of the participants.
One of the 12 interactive sessions of the Forum, on “Using science and data for understanding and reducing risks / Embrace innovation & Digitalisation”, was designed and implemented by the Science Pillar of the Knowledge Network — upon request of DG ECHO —in collaboration with the Italian Civil Protection Department and the ROADMAP project.
The session gathered around 80 participants from 27 countries. Engagement and interaction were extremely high: proof of which was its distinction as one of the most interesting and well-organised sessions of the Forum. This was achieved through the engagement of 5 high-level keynote speakers voicing key challenges from the academia, national and practitioner levels.
Prof. Maarja Kruusmaa (Chief Scientific Advisor with the European Commission), discussed the importance of science and innovation for prevention, in particular the role of science advice. Prof Virginia Murray (member of the Integrated Research on Disaster Risk (IRDR) scientific committee and Chair of the UNDRR/ISC Hazard Classification and Review Technical Working Group) talked about the importance of cross-sectoral collaboration – and terminology.
We were also joined by Prof. Tina Comes (chair of the SAPEA Working Group on the Future of Strategic Crisis Management in Europe) who discussed challenges in synthesizing research. Christian Resch (managing director of DCNA and member of the UNDRR European Science and Technology Advisory Group) presented the challenges for curating disaster risk and loss data at national level. And Maria POLESE (Associate Professor of 'Structural Engineering' at the University of Naples Federico II and key member of the ROADMAP project, funded under the Knowledge Network) discussed the challenges of sharing solutions for innovation across borders and sectors.
This was followed by 4 activities aimed at promoting existing tools to tackle these challenges: finding data (with the Risk Data Hub), finding research results (with CERIS and the DRMKC project explorer), finding knowledge across disciplines (with DRMKC books, documents and terminology work) and finding solutions (with the ROADMAP solutions explorer).
It was an opportunity to work closely with DG HOME (Cluster 3 of Horizon Europe), the Austrian Disaster Competence Network (DCNA), the UNDRR/Integrated Research for Disaster Reduction programme and – finally – the Scientific Advisory Mechanism and the Chief Science Advisor responsible for an upcoming opinion on improved crisis management.
