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Climate Change and Natural Disasters: Towards an Effective MENA cooperation

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6 hour course by Laurent Alfonso, Ministry of Europe and Foreign Affairs, France

  • Schedule: 30 June (16:30-18:30), 3 July (8:00-10:00) & 4 July (16:30-18:30)
  • Venue: Blanquerna

The Mediterranean basin, a unique geographical crossroads of Africa, Asia, and Europe, is experiencing climate change impacts at an accelerated rate, warming 20 percent faster than the global average. This rapid warming, coupled with extreme weather events, transforms the Mediterranean into a living laboratory for understanding the complex interplay between climate change and societal vulnerabilities. The First Mediterranean Assessment Report (MAR1), published by MedECC in 2020, underscored the unprecedented challenges facing the region, including ecosystem degradation, economic disruptions, and societal impacts. Recognizing the shared vulnerability within the Mediterranean, the countries of the Union for the Mediterranean face common hazards and interconnected challenges. These hazards, whether natural or human-induced, exacerbated by climate change, require a multifaceted approach. While a comprehensive list of all risks is extensive, a regional, sub-regional, cross-border, or risk-basin approach can effectively address these challenges. Mechanisms for enhanced cooperation and collaboration are crucial to fostering a more global and integrated response to these shared threats. This course explores past experiences, good practices and lessons learned in disaster risk reduction and management in a climate change context, as well as the avenues for new governance patterns and regional cooperation.

  • Laurent Alfonso

Laurent Alfonso
Ministry of Europe and Foreign Affairs, France

Professional firefighter for 30 years, on an operational level, he has commanded and participated in large-scale interventions such as floods and forest fires. He has developed skills in crisis management and coordination in evaluation and training missions in South America, Europe and the Mediterranean basin. Since 2018, he has worked as a foreign officer at the French Ministry of the Interior, in the Department of International Relations of the Directorate General for Civil Security and Crisis Management. He served as a liaison officer for the Union Civil Protection Mechanism (UCPM) and the Mediterranean Basin, and subsequently as a Senior Advisor in Civil Protection at the Union for the Mediterranean, where he initiated the Mediterranean Civil Protection Mechanism, aimed at expanding the UCPM to Southern countries. Within the UCPM, he is certificated as Team Leader, and has been deployed twice to South America: in 2017 as a forest fire expert in Chile, and 2019 in Bolivia.