CIS - Centro de Investigaciones Sociológicas

• Nearly 70% believe that forest fires will increase in the coming years, according to the latest survey on 'Civil Protection (III)' conducted by the CIS.
• For 90.3% this increase is due to the lack of cleaning and maintenance of the forests.
• 98.3% of Spaniards believe that it is necessary to improve cleaning, pruning, and clearing before fires.

The CIS has conducted its third survey on civil protection, which asks about forest fire management and the assistance services available to combat them.

69.7% believe the number of forest fires will increase in the coming years, while 13.2% think they will remain the same. 9.6% believe there will be fewer fires.

13.2% of those surveyed say they have been affected by a fire this year. Of these, 33.6% say they reacted to the fire with "confusion and anxiety," 28.4% with "fear and more moderate apprehension," and 28.3% with "calmness."

Regarding how the fire has affected them, 57.1% say they have experienced "limitations or disruptions to services or infrastructure, such as schools, roads, or utilities"; 51.1% say that "their town or surrounding area has suffered material or personal damage," and 28.4% "have had to wear a mask in their town."

43.8% of Spaniards say they have a "low or very low" level of knowledge about how to behave in a forest fire, while 32% say their knowledge is "very high or high."

Reasons for the fires

90.3% believe the increase in the number of fires is due to the lack of clearing and maintenance of the area's forests; 86.6% believe it is due to the abandonment of traditional practices that maintained the forest's balance; and 77.4% believe the cause is rural depopulation.

Fire management

55.1% of those surveyed are convinced that the most important aspect of fire management is prevention; 43.5% believe that prevention is as important as extinguishing fires, and only 0.8% say extinguishing fires is more important.

Regarding management, 54.3% believe their autonomous community, on its own, is "little or not at all prepared" to deal with forest fires, while 36.8% believe their community is "very or fairly prepared."

80.8% agree that it is preferable for their autonomous community's fire prevention and extinguishing services to be public, while 7.8% prefer to hire private companies. 5.3% agree that a mixed model is best.

Necessary actions

98.3% of Spaniards believe that cleaning, pruning, and clearing before fires must be improved, 97.9% say that fire prevention services must be improved, and 93.9% believe that the working conditions of fire prevention and extinguishing personnel must be improved.

Mobile notification

94.3% consider it useful to receive a mobile alert in the event of an extraordinary emergency in their area.
These and other data are collected in this survey conducted from September 8 to 12 with 3,004 interviews.