What is the project about?

Albania is exposed to a wide array of natural and man-made hazards and risks which include floods, fires, earthquakes, droughts, and industrial accidents. The Albanian Fire Protection & Rescue Service (AFPRS) is the primary operational search and rescue workforce in standby and ready-for-deployment, both in single small-scale incidents and in larger-scale disaster events, and a service delegated to local governments in the framework of the reform changes brought by the Territorial and Administrative Reform.
The earthquake event of 26 November 2019 was the most recent major disaster for Albania. Besides the damage it caused, the November 2019 earthquake provided Albania a unique opportunity to reflect on how to reduce vulnerability and enhance resilience at all levels in the future. The events that followed the earthquake, including the conclusion of the Post-disaster Needs Assessment (PDNA) report, showed that there is an urgent need to strengthen disaster preparedness, adopt adequate rescue and response systems and procedures, and improve the capacity of firefighting services. Such capacities must become functional across the government to save lives, livelihoods, and sustain development gains.
The Project will contribute to modernizing, increasing the standards and strengthening the operational and response capacities of the Albanian Fire Protection and Rescue Service through support to targeted municipal fire protection and rescue services.
The proposed intervention, made possible by the contribution of the Government of Poland and developed in partnership with UNDP, is fully in line with sectoral priorities and needs and in the spirit of the national action for enhancing the effectiveness and performance of the decentralized firefighting service. Support to strengthening the AFPRS is in line with the National Cross-cutting Decentralization and Local Government Strategy, the application of the Law 152/2015 “On Fire Protection and Rescue Service” as well as with Law 45/2019 ‘On Civil Protection”.

Specific Project Objectives

The Overall Project Objective is to contribute to modernizing,strengthening standards, and operational and response capacities of the Albanian Fire Protection and Rescue Service (AFPRS) through supporting  targeted municipal fire protection and rescue services.

In partnership with the beneficiary municipalities and the General Directorate of FPRS, the Project will work to achieve the following outputs:

• Construction of three fire stations in the municipalities of Lezha, Fier and Pogradec in accordance with sector following Build Back Better approach.

•  Provision of firefighting and search and rescue equipment to municipal firefighting stations.
  Three 4x4 fire trucks to be purchased for the municipalities of Lezha, Fier, and Pogradec,
  Three Urban Search and Rescue (USAR) containers to be purchased for the municipalities of Lezha, Fier, and Durres
  156  Personal Protection Equipment’s to be purchased benefiting the firefighting staff of the municipalities of Kamza, Kavaja, Kruja, Kurbin, Shijak, Lezha, Fier, and Pogradec

• Enhance firefighting response, search and rescue skills and capacities. Trainings on standardize basic and specific knowledge on firefighting as well as introduce training modules in line with the International Search and Rescue Advisory Group (INSARAG) as “the operational capability to assist with surface search and rescue in the immediate aftermath of the disaster for 356 firefighters.

Expected Results

Modernizing, increasing the standards, and strengthening the operational and response capacities of the Albanian Fire Protection and Rescue Service through support to targeted municipal fire protection and rescue services by construction fire stations in the municipalities of Lezha, Fier and Pogradec; provision of three 4x4 fire trucks to be donated to the municipalities of Lezha, Fier, and Pogradec; three USAR containers that will to be donated to the municipalities of Lezha, Fier, and Durres; provision of 156 PPEs for the firefighting staff of the municipalities of Kamza, Kavaja, Kruja, Kurbin, Shijak, Lezha, Fier, and Pogradec; Training on standardize basic and specific knowledge on firefighting as well as the operational capability to assist with surface search and rescue in the immediate aftermath of the disaster for 356 firefighters

What have we achieved so far?

Support the existing firefighting municipalities teams with tools and technologies to effectively pursue their mandate in Civil Protection and Disasters Risk Reduction (DRR).
The support is directly benfiting  ten municipalities encompassing a cumulative population of 1,258,600 residents or 45% of the total population and the material support will enhance the functionality of the firefighter teams of eight municipalities, covering a population of 701,178 residents or 25% of the total population. These statistics refer to the target municipalities, besides the fact each municipality has the obligation to assist neighboring municipalities and beyond, in cases of mass emergencies and disasters.
Increase the response capacities of these units by standardize basic and specific knowledge on firefighting as well as introduce training modules in line with the International Search and Rescue Advisory Group (INSARAG) as “the operational capability to assist with surface search and rescue in the immediate aftermath of the disaster”.