Call: Crisis management topic 6: Addressing standardisation opportunities in support of increasing disaster resilience

1. Excellent Science
2. Industrial Leadership
3. Societal Challenges

Specific objectives:

• to achieve a resource – and water - efficient and climate change resilient economy and society,
• the protection and sustainable management of natural resources and ecosystems, and
• a sustainable supply and use of raw materials, in order to meet the needs of a growing global population within the sustainable limits of the planet's natural resources and eco-systems.

The 20th century's era of seemingly plentiful and cheap resources is coming to an end. The ability of the economy to adapt and become more climate change resilient, resource efficient and at the same time remain competitive depends on high levels of eco-innovation, of a societal, economic, organisational and technological nature. With the global market for eco-innovation worth around 1 trillion € per annum and expected to triple by 2030, eco-innovation represents a major opportunity to boost competitiveness and job creation in European economies.

To ensure EU added value and given the transnational and global nature of the climate and the environment, their scale and complexity, and the international dimension of the raw materials supply chain, activities have to be carried out at the Union level and beyond. Reducing resource use and environmental impacts, whilst increasing competitiveness, will require a decisive societal and technological transition to an economy based on a sustainable relationship between nature and human well-being. Innovation in these fields will provide opportunities for growth and jobs, as well as innovative options involving science, technology including of ICT, the economy, society, policy and governance.

Research and innovation will cover the following broad lines of activities:

• Fighting and adapting to climate change
• Protecting the environment, sustainably managing natural resources, water, biodiversity and ecosystems
• Ensuring the sustainable supply of non-energy and non-agricultural raw materials
• Enabling the transition towards a green economy and society through eco-innovation
• Developing comprehensive and sustained global environmental observation and information systems
• Cultural heritage

Extreme weather and climate events, interacting with exposed and vulnerable human and natural systems, can lead to disasters. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), some types of extreme events (e.g. flash floods and related landslides, storm surges, heatwaves, fires, including vegetation fires) have increased in frequency or magnitude, and in the meantime populations and assets at risk have also increased, leading to greater disaster risks. In order to better forecast and manage the immediate consequences of weather- and climate-related disasters, in particular regarding emergency responses, improved measures and technologies are needed.

Increasing resilience to crises and disasters requires an orchestrated set of actions, including standardisation. While dedicated research projects and new topics look into different aspects of resilience to be investigated and further developed, at the same time related opportunities and needs for standardisation to support disaster resilience have to be addressed. Such standardisation activities could e.g. significantly improve the technical, procedural, operational and semantic interoperability of command, control and communication systems for crisis and disaster management, or the interoperability of detection equipment and tools in the areas of CBRNE. An analysis of European standardisation needs has been carried out within the Mandate M487 to establish Security Standards, which has led to the identification of standardisation priorities, for three selected security sectors (CBRNE, Crisis Management, Border Security). Similar trends are developed worldwide, which opens the scope for international cooperation. Besides this, research is needed on a longer term to identify and further elaborate potential standardisation opportunities in other technological and non-technological areas where a significant contribution to improve the disaster resilience through standardisation can be expected.

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