This morning, the Foreign Ministry’s Director General for Globalisation, Luca Sabbatucci, and the Director of the Civil Protection Department, Agostino Miozzo, opened the training week that Italy offers at the Farnesina to a delegation of high-level officials from Pacific Small Island Developing States (PSIDS), in which to exchange experiences and best practices in the area of civil protection.
The course aims to increase technical and scientific knowledge and the cooperation between Italy and the PSIDS in the sector of natural disaster prevention, management and response. In fact, Pacific Islands are exposed to cyclones and other increasingly high-frequency and intensity natural phenomena caused by climate change.
The training activity was organised at the proposal and with the sponsorship of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation in consideration of the excellent relations between Italy and the PSIDS, with the active contribution of the Civil Protection Department.
Besides its long-standing presence in the Pacific through several development cooperation programmes mainly focused on the sector of renewable energy sources and disaster response, Italy is greatly appreciated by the Pacific Small Island Developing States for its staunch support to prioritising the fight against climate change at the United Nations and in other international forums.
The nine officials (from the Cook Islands, Fiji, Kiribati, Nauru, Palau, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu) subsequently visited the situation rooms of the Central Functional Department at the Civil Protection Department. In the upcoming days, the delegation will visit some of the facilities of the Department – Fondazione CIMA, INGV – and of the Central Directorate for Emergencies, Technical Rescue and Forest Fires of the Department of the Fire Brigade and of the General Command of the Coast Guard, with training and on-the-field experiences and visits to enable participants to get acquainted with scientific and technical points of excellence of the Italian Civil Protection System.