After a record-breaking 2025 wildfire season, the message from Europe’s scientific and policy communities is unmistakable: wildfires are no longer a distant or regional threat—they are a shared European challenge demanding urgent, coordinated action, as well as aligned EU tools, policies, and investments.
Last Friday, FIRE-RES project coordinator and Director of the CTFC Antoni Trasobares participated in a high-Level roundtable on “Towards a Truly Integrated EU Approach on Wildfires”, hosted by the European Commission and led by Commissioners Jessika Roswall (Environment, Water Resilience and a Competitive Circular Economy) and Hadja Lahbib (Equality, Preparedness and Crisis Management). The discussion highlighted the growing environmental, social, and economic impacts of wildfires and the rising cost of inaction.
Antoni Trasobares underlined the importance of science-based, resilient, and multifunctional agroforestry landscapes, developed together with local communities. He stressed that integrated fire management, a strong bioeconomy, better management of wildland–urban interfaces, and greater involvement of private finance and insurance sectors will be essential to strengthening Europe’s wildfire resilience. Organisations such as the Centre de Ciència i Tecnologia Forestal de Catalunya and the Circular Bioeconomy Alliance remain committed to advancing these objectives.
Promoting science-based resilient and multifunctional agroforestry landscapes with local communities, integrated fire management, the bioeconomy, and managed wildland urban interfaces, as well as bringing the private finance and insurance sectors into the game, will be very important for achieving this."