Shared basic elements for a ‘European Doctrine on Disaster Risk and Crisis Management’ - The RODMAP Vision Paper

ROADMAP (European observatory on disaster risk and crisis management best practices) is a project funded by the European Union (EU) under the UCPM-2020-KN-AG call (ref. GA 101017776). The project has been carried out by a partnership of highly specialised institutions from Italy (The Consortium Italian Centre for Risk Reduction and the Italian Civil Protection Department), Norway (University of Stavanger) and Portugal (Association for the Development of Industrial Aerodynamics). The main goal of the project is to contribute to establishing the foundations or baselines of a European “Doctrine on disaster risk and crisis management” funded on the cooperation of scientific/academic communities and disaster risk management (DRM) authorities. In this light, ROADMAP contributes to increase access to information on DRM and disaster risk reduction (DRR) by systematically collecting, reviewing, and analysing past and ongoing experiences. The goal is to identify Good Practices (GPs), successful stories and lessons learnt, and make them readily available and usable to the communities and practitioners interested and active in DRM and DRR fields to further increase the understanding of DRM solutions, in compliance with the United Nations’ Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015-2030 (SFDRR, 2015). A continuous interaction between the ROADMAP Consortium, the DG-ECHO and the JRC have been pursued to achieve the project goal. Outcomes of the project (see Part II) have been organised in a web platform (the Solutions Explorer), where a number of GPs are present, and disseminated through periodical bulletins, webinars and three thematic papers focusing each on a selected relevant topic. Moreover, the project was supported by an Advisory Group (AG) of selected scientific/academic experts and decision-makers in the field of DRR and DRM. Invited speakers from the AG and from outside the project also contributed to the webinars. This vision paper for DG-ECHO is the final step of the project, since, according to the project description, “The vision paper, elaborating and systematizing the findings from thematic papers, shall put the baselines for the creation of a shared European ‘Doctrine on disaster risk and crisis management’, also evidencing the research needs and possible actions to promote”. Based on the experience gained in the development of the project and the interaction with the AG, this paper aims in particular to frame the activities aimed at building a European DRM doctrine in a longer-term perspective. On the one hand, what has been achieved so far represents a blueprint, the realisation of which still requires some steps to be taken. Therefore, a roadmap is proposed, which needs a further 18-24 months, and whose realisation should lead to a regular release of the products and services developed in ROADMAP. On the other hand, as envisaged by the project, this document is also intended to provide DG-ECHO with recommendations on possible longer-term initiatives, which would enable the full development of a DRM doctrine within the KN. The overarching goal is that the work done by the ROADMAP partners will help in the KN-related activities that DG-ECHO and JRC are planning and implementing.