Valuable equipment for protection and rescue from forest fires was acquired
In the premises of the Training Center for Protection and Rescue, the Directorate for Protection and Rescue of the Ministry of Internal Affairs was handed equipment for protection and rescue from forest fires, which was acquired as part of the Multi-Beneficiary IPA Program related to flood protection and forest fire risk management - IPA FF, worth 85,094.86 euros. The equipment was handed over by the project manager of the IPA FF program, Alessandro Dessi.
Acting Director General of the Directorate for Protection and Rescue of the MUP Miodrag Bešović thanked for this valuable donation and pointed out that this equipment will be used by the Montenegrin team for extinguishing forest fires from the ground during the field exercise, which is planned for the period 18-22. March 2024 in Skopje, as well as at various trainings and educations, but also during the fire season.
He also referred to the benefits of this program for Montenegro, emphasizing that so far a large number of trainings, seminars and study visits have been carried out in the field of protection and rescue from floods and forest fires, and at the Training Center for Protection and Rescue in Podgorica, from 19 until February 22 of this year, an operational training session will be held on the topic of extinguishing forest fires for the Montenegrin module/team for extinguishing forest fires from the ground, which has 25 members.
The multi-user IPA program related to flood protection and forest fire risk management - IPA FF began its implementation on November 15, 2020 and lasts until April 30, 2024, and the beneficiary countries of the program are: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Serbia and Turkey. The consortium implementing the program consists of: Department for Civil Protection of the Republic of Italy (DPC) - leading partner, Administration of the Republic of Slovenia for Civil Protection and Humanitarian Aid (URSZR), Swedish Emergency Situations Agency (ESA), General Inspectorate for Emergency Situations of the Ministry of Interior of Romania (IGSU), Fire and Rescue Brigade of the Moravian-Silesian Region (FRB-MSR), APELL National Center for Disaster Management from Romania and the Italian Research Foundation for Environmental Monitoring (CIMA Research Foundation). The general goal of the project is to strengthen regional cooperation and the exchange of best practices in the field of protection against floods and forest fires, to support the beneficiary countries of the program in harmonizing national legislation with the acquis of the EU and help in reaching EU standards and practices in the field of protection and rescue.