EU disaster response: the ENVI committee responds

The European Parliament’s ENVI Committee has adopted a draft report, ’’Towards a stronger European disaster response: the role of civil protection and humanitarian assistance’’. The goal is to reinforce disaster response capacity and to create synergies between existing mechanisms in order to avoid duplication of work and operate more cost-effectively.


The draft report by rapporteur Elisabetta Gardini (EPP, Italy) welcomes the homonymous Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament and the Council, ’’Towards a stronger European diaster response: the role of civil protection and humanitarian assistance’’ and its objectives. It encourages the EU to implement an enhanced, effective, cost-efficient and visible European disaster response. To reinforce capacity, a European Emergency Response Capacity should be set up, based on Members States’ assets and expertise.

Moreover, the draft report proposes the creation of a 24/7 European Emergency Response Centre (EERC) that merges the current Monitoring and Information Centre (MIC) and the ECHO humanitarian crisis room as a new coordination platform for planning and coordination that would collect real-time information on disasters, monitor hazards, alert member states, and coordinate the EU’s disaster response actions.

The rapporteur also welcomes the establishment of an EERC as a simplification of the current Civil Protection Mechanism, which is considered too bureaucratic. Stressed is the need for better coordination: to avoid overlapping and duplication of efforts on the political and the operational side, including logistics and tranport, and to be more (cost-)effective.

Finally, in line with the recent EPHA response to the public consultation on health security in the EU, the report underlines that it is important that all Member States act in the spirit of European solidarity by contributing to the European disaster response.

Timeline:
- Vote in ENVI: 13 July
- Vote in Plenary: 26 September

See also:
- EPHA briefing on health threats from communicable diseases

EPHA related articles

- € 10 million to fight epidemic outbreaks in developing countries
- World Health Day 2009 - Better health system responses to disasters
- Climate change and health
- EPP Group Hearing: What lessons learnt from H1N1 influenza pandemic?
- ENVI Committee workshop on European Pandemic Response
- First European Flu Summit

Last modified on September 6 2011.