MitigACT project, mitigating natural disaster risk in resilient societiesfirst results of the case study forest fires in Galicia

Abstract

This paper aims to present and analyze the results of the case study “Forest Fires” from MitigACT project funded in the 2019 by Ministry of Science, Innovation and Universities (PID2019-107443RA-I00). The full title of the MitigACT research project is Mitigating risk in resilient societies. Incorporating experience-based knowledge in environmental disaster prevention, management and recovery. Its main objective is to improve resilience to natural hazards through social knowledge that facilitate the co-production of policies and plans for prevention, management and recovery from environmental disasters. Following this approach, “Forest Fires” case supports the idea that in order to improve public governance of environmental disaster, it is necessary to approach the problem from a multidimensional, multifocal and multiagent perspective, paying special attention to local knowledge, which must be included as an element to be considered in public policies. From a qualitative approach, based on in-depth interviews with people with direct experience related forest fires we obtained recommendations to correct the existing imbalance between the three phases of prevention, management and recovery in the fight against fire.