On the International Day for Disaster Risk Reduction, the European Committee of the Regions (CoR) held a plenary debate with Mami Mizutori, Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for Disaster Risk Reduction, and Janez Lenarčič, European Commissioner for Crisis Management, on how to increase resilience to disasters. ECR member Roberto Ciambetti emphasised the importance of taking a coordinated approach to reduce risks. 

The debate came after a summer during which many of Europe's regions, cities and villages were severely affected by natural disasters. The devastating floods and fires that ravaged Europe showed the need to ramp up prevention, preparedness and response, combined with accelerating climate adaptation and the green transition. On the role of local and regional authorities, Mr Ciambetti, President of the Veneto regional council, stated: "we are the ones who are responsible both politically and institutionally in protecting inhabitants from the emergency planning phase to coordinating. Local authorities are and will be asked for help first, as they are naturally closer to their citizens and should be able to act fastest."

In this regard the ECR member emphasized how important prevention is and called for more "targeted training for public safety practitioners, such as community leaders, social and medical care practitioners and rescue services, which will help contain a disaster and reduce fatalities both during and in the aftermath of the crisis". This in turn would contribute to building a "real culture of civil protection", he offered.

Mr Ciambetti concluded by calling on the CoR "to continue working closely with the UNDRR to ensure that the voice of citizens, cities and regions is heard by all policy makers". The "terrifying situation", as he put it, is that if we do not intervene soon "we will have to deal with more and more sudden floods, desertification of large areas of the planet, increase in water levels and consequently the loss of crops", warned the ECR member.