Social impact, risk perception and tsunami knowledge in communities participating in the Tsunami Ready programme.

The growth of urbanisation in Mediterranean coastal areas, along with the development of tourist infrastructure and high-impact industrial facilities (R.I.R.), escalates the threat of marine hazards, including tsunamis for coastal populations.

In this context, tsunami risk can be mitigated by strengthening early warning systems, as well as preparedness and response strategies at the local community level. The Tsunami Ready programme, promoted by UNESCO, aims to enhance the knowledge, awareness and response capacity of coastal communities that voluntarily join the initiative, through the achievement of twelve indicators.

This is the first study to conduct an ex‑ante assessment of tsunami‑risk information needs in Italian coastal municipalities, focusing on those currently enrolled in the. The objective is to analyze the population’s level of awareness, risk perception and preparedness with respect to tsunami risk.

To assess these aspects, a structured questionnaire, developed as part of the CoastWAVE project promoted by UNESCO-IOC and funded by European DG-ECHO funds, was used. The questionnaire was administered to a sample of residents stratified by age, gender and education level representative of coastal communities to make the survey statistically robust. A total of 303 interviews were collected in the individual coastal municipalities involved in the development of the Tsunami Ready programme, considering two coastal municipalities to the north and two to the south of the target municipality.

The ongoing study aims to conduct a deep analysis of issues related to the population’s knowledge of marine hazards, trust in warning systems, sources of information used, level of preparedness in response to a potential alert, and the expectations placed on the institutions responsible for risk management. All these elements were brought together in a multi‑hazard survey tool.

The expected results will allow us to identify the main information gaps and communication weaknesses and provide operational guidance for more effective and context‑appropriate risk communication strategies, in line with the Tsunami Ready programme. The study will also produce recommendations to improve the messages and tools used by early warning and marine‑risk mitigation systems in the municipalities involved. From a European perspective, this work is relevant for UNESCO both for its methodological approach and for the use of a shared survey instrument that can be replicated in different coastal communities.