WILDFIRE MANAGEMENT: TRAINING AND AWARENESS

WILDFIRE MANAGEMENT: TRAINING AND AWARENESS

Conveners: Agustín Merino, Cristina Santín, Daniel Moya and Artemi Cerdà

Wildfires can seriously impact the environment, human well-being, rural development and economy. Although the wildfire research community is very active and substantial technical advances have been made in recent years, there is a shortage of skilled workers, mainly due to the lack of quality training in Forest Fire Management. This training on Fire Management is complex. It requires inputs from related disciplines, participation of different stakeholders, continuous updating and hands-on experience. Introducing innovative educational approaches and reinforcing training capacities will contribute to overcoming the shortage of skilled workers and will also boost employment and development in fire-prone regions with high unemployment rates.

Many wildfire researchers and professionals are involved in the development of teaching, training and awareness activities around the world. This session will discuss existing good practices in Fire Management Training and Educational Strategies and Tools. It aims to identify existing study programmes, strategies and tools used in fire-prone areas. This information will help to reinforce the existing educational paths and to establish new and jointly designed study approaches.