Safe keeping- Fire protection
The Management Body of the Parnitha National Park, in the context of the responsibilities explicitly assigned to it by the legislator, tries to promote the coordinated and organized action of the bodies that intervene in the area of the Parnitha National Park in order to protect it. There are several volunteer groups and several individual volunteers in Parnitha. The number of people who have expressed interest in offering volunteer work in the National Park and especially in the field of protection has increased after the fire of 2007. The starting point of the cooperation of the Parnitha National Park Management Body with voluntary organizations is placed in 2007. The fire season In 2007, the Agency attempted for the first time to reach out to the non-governmental organizations operating in Parnitha, through a series of gatherings at the Agency’s offices, where the problems of the region, the action of each forest protection organization and the possibilities of cooperation, coordination were discussed. and creating a single action plan. For the legal coverage of both the Agency and the volunteers, each volunteer group had signed a contract for the provision of volunteer work for the period of employment of volunteers in Parnitha and the volunteers carried an official identity card, which showed the logo of the Agency. As the effort was new, the Agency faced several difficulties, with the main difficulty being to ensure the safety of the volunteers.
After evaluating the experience gained in 2007 and addressing any difficulties that had arisen, the Managing Authority each year continues its cooperation with the voluntary organizations active in the mountainous area of Parnitha.
The main axes set by the Management Body of Parnitha National Park are:
- Coordination of all volunteer groups, in matters of forest fire prevention, by the Management Body. In order to coordinate and inform the voluntary organizations that are active in Parnitha, meetings are held between the voluntary organizations and the staff of the Agency.
- Staffing of permanent outposts with weekly responsible planning.
- Reinforcement of volunteer groups with equipment (such as compasses, binoculars, night vision goggles) and vehicle fuel. The coordination of all involved bodies, for the utilization of the infrastructure, the equipment and the available personnel is the request for the preservation of the Parnitha National Park.
Voluntary Reforestation
The Management Body of Parnitha National Park started in 2010 a pilot program of voluntary reforestation, with successful results. The reforestation works carried out include sowing and planting in the burned areas with planting material of Parnitha, as well as seedling treatments of previous reforestation. In summary, since November 2010, 71 reforestation works have been carried out with the participation of 2,650 volunteers and a total of 7,535 spruce seedlings have been planted, while care works have been carried out on approximately 43,000 spruce and pine seedlings. Also, in addition to the above, to date more than fifteen voluntary actions have been carried out with various volunteer groups (ANIMA, EDASA, etc).
Volunteers participating in reforestation must attend a theoretical training and internship program. Theoretical training is done in two ways, namely by distance seminar (e-learning) or by training seminar in rooms to be announced by the Agency. The internship takes place in Parnithas on working days.
The participation of the public in this action is quite large and a very good cooperation has been developed between the Agency and the various volunteer groups.
