Päästeliit visited Sweden
The organisation provides training in areas such as household crisis preparedness, first aid, CPR, crisis support, child safety and civil defence. It also plays an important role in training and supporting Voluntary Resource Groups (FRGs), ensuring that municipalities have access to trained volunteers during crises.
During the visit, we focused primarily on learning about the activities of Voluntary Resource Groups (FRGs). An FRG is a system through which a municipality can organise and deploy volunteers as additional personnel during a crisis. Its purpose is to support the municipality with tasks such as evacuations, sharing information, distributing water, providing first aid and assisting people affected by the crisis. FRG members are trained volunteers from various organisations who can also help coordinate spontaneous volunteers arriving to offer assistance.
On Saturday, we received a broader overview of how civil protection is organised in Sweden and how the various organisations operate. In particular, we learned how several different organisations cooperate in a structured manner, with full funding and the readiness to respond to all types of crises with the support of volunteers. During the second half of the day, we saw how Sweden trains volunteers to provide emergency water supplies to residents in areas where drinking water has been contaminated or is difficult to access.
Sweden uses mobile water containers for distribution, which can be easily folded and stored.
On Sunday, we had the opportunity to participate in a joint exercise involving volunteers from three Swedish regions. The exercise tested the involvement of spontaneous volunteers, the preparation and distribution of food, and radio communications. A strong emphasis was placed on practising how to rescue people in difficult conditions and extinguish fires using volunteer resources alone. Sweden is regarded as one of Europe’s leading countries in civil protection, so it was encouraging to see that Estonia has already learned a great deal from Sweden and that our systems and approaches to crisis response are broadly similar.
Gallery: https://www.flickr.com/photos/155023592@N06/albums/72177720333960918
RiA-ENGAGE is a project led by the Council of the Baltic Sea States (CBSS) that strengthens disaster risk reduction and crisis preparedness in the Baltic Sea region and Ukraine by increasing the involvement of civil society and volunteers. The project aims to improve cooperation between the public sector and civil society organisations by developing a cooperation mechanism and training materials, which will be tested in crisis scenarios involving both military threats and extreme weather events. The project brings together voluntary organisations from Estonia, Ukraine and Sweden, supported by colleagues from Poland, Latvia, Lithuania and Germany through the CBSS CREWS project.
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info@paasteliit.ee
+372 527 4112
Sirge 2, 10618 Tallinn, Eesti
PÄÄSTELIIT
Register number 80302703
IBAN EE547700771002741382