WRITTEN QUESTION P-2319/00

by Véronique Mathieu (EDD) to the Commission

(30 June 2000)

Subject: Civil protection and combatting fires caused by storms

The storms which occurred in December 1999 are continuing to have an impact, as European forests affected by the storms are threatened with the risk of fire. Outbreaks of fires have already been recorded in some forests.

Preventing disasters means improving fire safety.

1. Does the Commission not consider that the prevention of fires resulting from the effects of the storms comes within the scope of the Community programme in the field of civil protection established by the Council decision of 9 December 1999?

2. How does the Commission apply the precautionary principle which is the subject of its communication of 2 February 2000 to the prevention of fires resulting from the storms?

3. Could the Commission say whether an assessment of the risk of fires resulting from the storms has been carried out at Community level?

4. What measures have been co-financed under Regulation (EEC) No 2158/92(1) which provides for a Community scheme for the protection of forests against fire aimed at:

- identifying the causes of forest fires;

- identifying the means of combatting them?

5. What steps does the Commission intend to take in order to improve the system for monitoring forests following natural or technological disasters?

(1) OJ L 217, 31.7.1992.

Supplementary answer given by Mr Fischler on behalf of the Commission

(28 July 2000)

The Commission confirms that, as the Honourable Member points out, the storms of December 1999 have aggravated the risks of forest fire not only by increasing combustibility (dead, dry or broken trees), but also by making it more difficult to reach any fires which occur (inaccessible tracks and water points, tangled windfalls in stands).

1. and 3. Prevention of fires and assessment of fire risks resulting from storms' effects could be covered by Council Decision 1999/847/EC of 9 December 1999 establishing a Community action programme in the field of civil protection(1), provided that the eligibility criteria stipulated are met. However, specific measures which are eligible under other Community instruments cannot be financed under the action programme.

2. Natural disasters such as the storm of December 1999 are exceptional and unforeseeable phenomena. Nevertheless, and although it did not directly carry out an assessment of the fire risks resulting from the storms, the Commission can take the initiative in asking Member States to take into account the assessment of that risk in the forest-fire protection plans submitted under Article 3 of Regulation (EEC) No 2158/92(2).

4. Between 1992 and 1999, 18 million were allocated under Regulation (EEC) No 2158/92 to measures concerned with the causes of fire. The measures related to providing information and raising public awareness, studying risk forecast systems, setting up cause investigation teams, studying the causes of fire and the resources needed to fight them (rubbish dump inventory and absorption plan, fires stemming from electricity, fires stemming from farming), monitoring weather conditions and making digitised risk maps.

5. If Member States so wish, the Commission will gladly examine in the context of Member States' annual forest-fire protection plans and within the limits of the appropriations available proposals for improving forest-fire protection measures, and particularly forest-fire monitoring, in storm-affected areas at risk. The Commission has just developed a new system for daily notification of the forest-fire risk level. The system, which uses satellites to identify risks, is undergoing trials from 15 June to 30 September 2000. On the basis that parameters relating to plant stress and evapotranspiration of wooded areas play a predominant role, the system constitutes a highly reliable instrument.

(1) OJ L 327, 21.12.1999.

(2) Within the meaning of Article 2 of the Regulation.