National risk assessment 2018

Abstract

The drafting of Finland's national risk assessment is based on Decision No. 1313/2013/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council of 17 December 2013 on a Union Civil Protection Mechanism. In accordance with Article 6 of the Decision, Member States must develop risk assessments at the national or appropriate sub-national level and submit a summary of the relevant elements to the Commission every three years. The first national risk assessment was drafted in 2015. The Union Civil Protection Mechanism, which serves as the basis for the national risk assessment, encompasses the protection of people, the environment and property against all kinds of natural and man-made disasters, both within and outside the Union. Every effort has been made to use existing risk assessments or equivalent products and processes produced by other actors in drafting the national risk assessment. In practice, the national risk assessment is a harmonised summary of proprietary risk assessments of different actors. Various administrative branches have specified threat scenarios and serious disruptions affecting critical social functions and infrastructures at the national level. The threat scenarios and disruptions specified by each administrative branch include verbal descriptions of the threat or threats on which the threat scenarios and disruptions are based, the threat target, course of action and the concatenation and recurrence of faults and disruptions. Change trends in the probability of threat scenarios and serious disruptions were assessed. An impact assessment was conducted to determine whether each threat scenario and serious disruption would have a direct or indirect impact on critical social functions and infrastructures.