The number of firefighters in Spain grows by 14% due to the increase in fires, while it decreases in the EU

Jubrique, in Málaga, and Navalacruz, in Ávila, were two of the many black spots where devastating fires broke out two summers ago. Regions of many Mediterranean countries suffered the consequences of very high temperatures, drought and arson. In Greece, the flames stalked the archaeological sites of Olympia, Delphi or Epidaurus; while in Italy, Sicily was once again the scene of the disaster, as has also happened this year.

Despite the fact that the south of the continent suffers fires year after year, in the European Union as a whole the total number of active firefighters dropped in 2022 to 359,783 troops, 5,300 less than in the previous year and the equivalent of only 0 .2% of the total employed population, according to data published this Monday by Eurostat.

Germany, in which last year an area of 4,293 hectares burned compared to the 306,555 that burned in Spain -according to the European Information System on Forest Fires-, is the country with the largest endowment: 64,869 firefighters, despite that lost troops in 2022. It is followed by Spain, which has 42,011 firefighting professionals. After the 2021 fires, our country has been the second country that has increased its workforce the most, incorporating 5,233 workers last year.

Greece, which in 2021 was devastated by flames and where 22,480 hectares burned, is the one that has increased the number of firefighters the most, by 6,900 people, to a total of 18,741. The third country that has reinforced this force the most is Slovakia, with 3,500 more firefighters, and in fourth place is Italy, which has incorporated 2,000 employees and ranks as the country with the third most firefighters in the EU: 41,444.

Eurostat does not offer an index of how many troops each country has compared to its forest area, but it does publish the proportion that this group represents with respect to the total number of employed persons in the country.

Greece, Estonia and Cyprus are the countries with the highest proportion of firefighters, there, for every thousand workers, four are firefighters. The weight drops to three out of every thousand in Romania and is below three in many others, such as Spain, where only two out of every thousand employees are firefighters. In Italy, the proportion falls below two (1.79), in France it is much lower (1.38) and the Netherlands is the only state in which less than one in a thousand is a firefighter (0.06). .

The profession is highly masculinized, for every 347,305 firefighters in Europe, there are only 12,478 women in the trade, and there is currently no aging problem, since there are troops in all age groups: 18% are between 40 and 44 years; 16.6%, between 35 and 39 years; 13.6% between 40 and 49 years; 13.4%, between 30 and 34 years old; another 13.4% are 55 years of age or older; 12.5% are under 30 years of age and 12% between 50 and 54 years of age.

34,000 million euros

In 2021 – the latest year for which data is available – the EU allocated a total of 34,133 million euros to fire protection, 2.5% more than in the previous year, and the equivalent of 0.2% of GDP community.

Spain was the fourth country -behind Greece, France and Italy- with the highest disbursement, of 2,375 million euros, 6.8% more than in 2020, and also the equivalent of 0.2% of GDP.

The budget that countries dedicate to fire prevention has been increasing in recent years and should continue to do so in the coming years, as climate change is bringing forward the fire season, which is no longer limited to just summer. In Spain, in March of this year, there were already fires, which devastated Teruel and Castellón, for example.

In 2013, the total area burned in Spain was 37,069 hectares, with which, in a decade, the virulence of fires has multiplied by ten. The month of July, for example, was the warmest in Spain in the historical series, which began in 1961, and the fifth warmest in the 21st century, with two heat waves in its course. In addition, it was very dry in terms of rainfall, with a rainfall value equivalent to 59% of the normal value for the month (extracted from the average from 1991 to 2020). It was the thirteenth driest July since 1961 and the fourth so far this century.