The Community of Wildfire Innovation kicks off in the Living Lab Gran Canaria

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On November 5, the Cabildo de Gran Canaria hosted the first meeting of the Community of Wildfire Innovation in Gran Canaria (CWI-GC), heart of one of the Living Labs. The event brought together 15 representatives from public administrations, private sector, research organisations and civil society.

Courtesy of Medi XXI GSA

The CWI-GC consists of a group of actors with decision-making power over the Gran Canarian territory. The community discusses what innovations are needed in the forest fires sector to achieve a fire-resilient landscape and establishes the roadmap for the coming years. Through a series of collective exercises, this first meeting led by the Cabildo de Gran Canaria was an opportunity to:

  • Define the current situation and the critical factors for integrated fire management on the island,

  • Outline the common vision to be achieved in the short and medium term and,

  • Identify current deficiencies and necessary innovations to achieve the objectives

The conclusions emerging from the debate between the different actors will be compiled and used to draw up the roadmap towards integrated fire management, based on the common vision agreed by the participants.

In addition to this first meeting, progress was also made on several Innovation Actions being developed in the Living Lab Gran Canaria.

Within the framework of “IA 4.5. Analysis of regional policies for a coherent and inclusive fire risk governance“, a debate session was held on November 6 to analyse the level of integration of fire risk and prevention in the conservation policies of Protected Natural Areas on the island of Gran Canaria. In this session, the community discussed the regional and national nature conservation policy instruments with a major impact on the management of fire risk on the island.

Through various group exercises techniques, the participants identified the main conflicts and limitations of such tools, ultimately exploring possible solutions to improve their coherence.

Courtesy of Medi XXI GSA

Another of the Innovation Actions addressed in this event was IA 1.5. One of the wildfire preventive measures proposed in the framework of this action is the use of extensive grazing as a fire prevention tool on the island. For its implementation, FIRE-RES collaborates with the strategy for the prevention of large forest fires of the Cabildo of Gran Canaria, GRAN CANARIA MOSAICO. Within the framework of this strategy, the Cabildo of Gran Canaria allocates prescribed grazing areas in public forests and ravines where shepherds are financially remunerated for the service of forest fire prevention in the form of Payments for Environmental Services.

Finally, participants discussed the implementation of “IA2.6. Designing post-fire restoration strategies” in the Canary Islands LL.

Author: Eva Samblas (Medi XXI GSA)

Contributors: Beatrice Bellavia (Euromontana).