Community Safety Action for Supporting Climate Adaptation and Development, Cascade, deals with risk management of climate change at the city level in the Baltic Sea Region.
The aim of Cascade is to strengthen the knowledge about macro-regional and city-level climate change risks within the Baltic Sea Region. The focus is to increase the practical risk management capability. The project will create positive cascading effects at the fire and rescue services by training the trainers. Relevant national authorities and international bodies facilitate the project through support and visibility. The project will enforce the connection between local administrations and national civil protection authorities to face both the Sendai indicators (Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015–2030) and the challenges of climate change risks. Besides, Cascade will also invite contacts between practitioners and experts at universities and governances, contributing to mutual learning processes.
Cascade will develop a risk assessment methodology, applicable to the Baltic Sea Region climate change risks in urban contexts. These activities are accompanied by training courses for local decision makers, spatial planners, developers, critical infrastructure operators, rescue services etc. on how to assess and manage the climate change risks. Finally, the project will also arrange policy dialogues between local, macro-regional, national, and international actors for multilevel risk governance.
Cascade is an innovative and new project, as this type of project has not been implemented in the Baltic Region before, nor do the expected outcomes exist. The project boarders the approach of risk governance in cross level and network composition from local to international level. At the same time, the risk management process is handled from both a holistic and concrete hands on perspective.
The role for Baltic University Programme is to ensure a continuity of all the material produced within Cascade. This will result in a course curriculum for continuing education on university level, available on BUP Finland’s web page.
Cascade is managed by BUP Finland at the Centre for Lifelong Learning at Åbo Akademi University. Contact person Cecilia Lundberg.