by Silvia Musso
French citizens have a new inter-ministerial website focused on environmental information of both natural and technological risks, www.risques.gouv.fr. The goal is raising awareness and preparing people to every risk situation in order that – as the press release of the Government’s Information Service quotes – the essential actions to guarantee an individual and collective protection would be better understood and more effectively applied.
The on line portal, very good structured, precisely classified different risks that citizens could face. The home page has a clear interface with, on the left, the list of risks divided for three categories: natural risks as hot, cold, avalanche, fires, earthquakes, etc., technological risks as industrial or nuclear accidents and risks for people’s health. For every kind of risk, there is a detailed file that provides information about the comprehension of the danger and about how to protect themselves before, during and after the hazardous situation. There are also examples of French history’s disasters and videos shown in a didactic way. The effective use of documentaries, which are explicit and immediate, and the description of a wide range of risks, are something new that distinguish it than to similar but more sectorial experiences, which exist in many other Countries, as the National Hurricane Center in the USA, the Environment Canada or many of the hydrological-weather services in the world referring in particular way to the climatic risk. Moreover the French portal offers a useful search that make you able to know the list of specific risks and at the voice “Info prevention” it is possible the download of a guidelines about how to face emergencies. It is an handbook, called “Soyez prets!” (Be ready!) to know how to behave in hazardous situations without being paralyzed by panic and to help themselves and the others.
According to Luca Mercalli, Italian climatologue and member of the AICA’s Scientific Committee: «This portal is a useful tool to create a common awareness on natural and industrial risks among citizens, even though, I think that, as all web products, it would work, at least in Italy, just on a little part of the population, culturally advanced. Many people would be excluding because they are not used to Internet».
This French model that, according to Mercalli, could be imported in our Contry, making for example the www.protezionecivile.it more useful, even being a very good starting point, would be still partial to make institutional communication on environmental risks in Italy really diffused and effective.
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