Vade-Mecum of Civil Protection in the European Union

The purpose of the Vade-mecum is to give a general overview of the measures taken by the Member States as well as at Community level in order to deal with disasters. It covers topics which are mainly of interest :

• to responsible officials working in the field of civil protection at the national, regional and local level, particularly in the area of preparedness for emergencies,
• to volunteers and non-governmental organizations,
• to interested members of the public.

This includes the description of disasters, the emergency plan anticipating disasters, as well as the organization of intervention in the Member States and a summary of the agreements signed between Member States. It also presents the progress achieved by the European Commission together with the national services in setting up cooperation in the field of Civil Protection.

Disasters may be due to either natural causes, such as earthquakes, landslides, forest fires, floods, snowstorms, tidal waves, etc., or to human activity, such as in the case of accidents involving chemicals, etc. Cooperation could be necessary :

• because several States are affected by the disaster,
• because of the magnitude of the disaster as regards the human, social and economic consequences,
• because of the exceptional nature of the disaster,
• because of the novel nature of the disaster inherent in the development of certain modern technologies.

It should be noted that the Vade-mecum is not primarily concerned with:

• the management of nuclear accidents already covered by other Community arrangements and by cooperation within the framework of the Euratom Treaty. However a brief outline of the National Emergencies arrangements are presented in an annex;
• reciprocal health assistance, which is the subject of a parallel Community activity (cf. Report EUR 8271 (1983): "Measures for reciprocal health assistance to be applied in the event of disasters, serious accidents or exceptionally serious diseases", currently under review),
• the management of major marine pollution incidents, already covered by a specific Community Action Programme, the Community Information System as well as bilateral and multilateral agreements in this field.

A list of links to National Authorities and Structures is also available.

The Text of the Vademecum is available for downloading in Adobe Acrobat^® format.