The last Annual Practitioners Forum of the DARENet (Danube River Region Resilience Exchange network) project and the Dissemination Conference of PROFOUND (Procedures of Rescue Organizations in Flood Operations Unified in the Danube Region) project with the EU Strategy for the Danube Region Environmental Risks Priority Area (PA5) Disaster Management Working Group Meeting took place between the 17th and 18th November 2022 in a joint event in Budapest.
On 17 November 2022, Letter of Intent was signed in Budapest by Vice President László Bérczi, PhD on behalf of CTIF Danube Countries Working Group and by Zsolt Kelemen, Chair of Disaster Management Working Group of EU Strategy for the Danube Region Environmental Risks Priority Area with a view to strengthening collaboration within the Danube Region in the areas below:
- consulting on European legislation;
- exchange project and survey results, statistics and publications;
- exchange project-related information (e.g. newsletter and media releases);
- invitations to relevant meetings and conferences (at the parties’ own cost).
President of four national firefighter associations have already counter-signed this Letter of Intent:
- Mr. Ante SANADER, President of the Croatian Firefighter Association;
- FF. BG. Tibor DOBSON, President of the Hungarian Firefighter Association;
- Mr. Dragan ĆAPIN, President of the Serbian Firefighter Association;
- Janko CERKVENIK, President of the Slovenian Firefighter Association.
The counter-signatures from CTIF President, CTIF Danube Working Group Secretary, and Presidents of the Austrian Firefighter Association, and the Slovakian Firefighter Association will take place later.
The highlights of the PROFOUND full-scale field exercise, which took place between 30 August and 3 September 2022 in Slovakia, Romania and Hungary, was presented by Kinga Perge, Chief Exercise Controller of PROFOUND Exercise and senior advisor for EUSDR PA5. The main evaluator, Tamás Endrődi, shared the main findings and recommendations of the evaluation of the exercise. Then the recently finalized Slovakian-Hungarian project, RISKHUB, was introduced by Zsolt Kelemen. The overview of the recent projects related to the Danube region gave a chance for the participants to benefit from the results and lessons learnt, and also to consider the recommendations for the new proposals and joint activities.
After the keynote presentations, the participants had the chance to discuss different topics about regional framework and preparedness activities at Danube region level, cross-border cooperation and standards and procedures of disaster response organizations.
On the 18th November, the DAREnet General Assembly meeting took place, where the members could discuss about the progresses they achieved since the last meeting.
The participants also discussed the way forward regarding the current proposals, the DAREnet partnership and the planned activities of the DMWG in the next years.
In the afternoon the Slovakian, Serbian, and Hungarian participants had the chance to take part in an INTERREG A (cross-border cooperation) meeting to jointly plan, form consortiums and align their objectives for the coming Calls of the programme.
The two-day forum provided a great opportunity for sharing information and ideas amongst the governmental and non-governmental disaster response organizations from Austria, Bosnia and Hercegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Serbia and Hungary.
