The EU Civil Protection Mechanism co-finances projects that support efforts of Member States and participating states in the field of disaster prevention and preparedness.
Disasters caused by natural and human-induced hazards, acts of terrorism, technological, radiological and environmental accidents know no borders. Experience shows that cooperation in civil protection among European countries makes prevention and preparedness more effective and, ultimately, protects lives and economies.
Through prevention and preparedness projects, the EU facilitates cooperation between the 27 EU Member States as well as Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Iceland, Moldova, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Norway, Serbia, Türkiye, and Ukraine towards 5 goals:
- To achieve a higher level of protection against disasters with cross-border impacts or that may affect several Member States by:
- preventing or reducing their potential effects
- fostering a culture of prevention and preparedness
- improving cooperation and coordination between civil protection and other relevant stakeholders, their complementarity and interoperability.
- To support the implementation of the EU Disaster Resilience Goals through the development, validation of disaster risk management tools, operational concepts and procedures, and knowledge exchange.
- To contribute to building competencies, skills, knowledge and expertise in civil protection and disaster risk management.
- To strengthen knowledge partnerships between civil protection and disaster risk management actors and to support the uptake of scientific outcomes by operational stakeholders.
- To contribute to raising further awareness of communities on the risks they face and options for reducing their vulnerability.
Funding opportunities are available through annual calls for proposals helping civil protection authorities and their partners develop actions for disaster risk management.
Funding opportunities
The previous 2-track approach of awarding grants for single-country (Track I) or multi-country projects (Track II) has seen changes in 2023.
Grants for prevention and preparedness actions will henceforth be awarded through the ‘Technical assistance for disaster risk management’ (single-country) and the ‘Knowledge for action in prevention and preparedness’ (multi-country) grants.
These new calls are the results of an effort to refit and revamp the prevention and preparedness programme, and they have been designed in alignment with the EU Disaster resilience goals and the Wildfire prevention action plan.
Technical assistance for disaster risk management
These grants provide authorities of eligible countries with financial support for the development of strategic disaster risk management activities. They aim to prepare investments or to strengthen the institutional and policy framework for disaster risk management.
The annual call for proposals is published on the Funding & tender opportunities portal.
These grants have been known as “Track I: Single-Country Grants” during the period 2019-2022.
The list of grants awarded in previous years is available here: 2024, 2023, 2022, 2021, 2020, 2019.
Knowledge for action in prevention and preparedness (KAPP)
The KAPP call has a multi-country focus. Through it, the European Commission is supporting action on disaster prevention and preparedness, and providing a testing environment and learning opportunity through full-scale field exercises.
The KAPP call merges 3 previously separate calls: “Prevention and preparedness”, “Knowledge network partnership”, and “Full-scale exercises”. With the merger, the overall objectives are more clearly visible across the different call topics and the application process is streamlined.
More information can be found on the Funding & tender opportunities portal.
The prevention grants have been known before 2023 as “Track II: Multi-Country Grants”. They promoted cross-border collaborations for disaster resilience.
Grants awarded in previous years: 2023, 2022, 2021, 2020, 2019, 2018, 2017, 2016, 2015, 2014.
Find out more
Read about recently awarded projects on the Union Civil Protection Knowledge Network platform.
For older projects, you can find them in the DG ECHO database.