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NFPA Fire & Life Safety Ecosystem™ 

When it comes to fire prevention and protection, safety is not something we can take for granted. The NFPA Fire & Life Safety Ecosystem™ is a framework that identifies the components that must work together to minimize risk and help prevent loss, injuries, and death from fire, electrical, and other hazards.

NFPA is committed to promoting the Fire & Life Safety Ecosystem to protect people and property against evolving safety threats, and wants to work with others who are part of this critical system. You can also view this information en Español and em Português.

Understanding the NFPA Fire & Life Safety Ecosystem

There are eight key components in the Fire & Life Safety Ecosystem. These components are interdependent. When they work together, the Ecosystem protects everyone. If any component is missing or broken, the Ecosystem can collapse, often resulting in tragedy. Almost always we can trace the cause of injurious life safety incidents and tragedies back to the breakdown of one or more components.

NFPA Fire & Life Safety Ecosystem Assessment Tool

This tool helps users identify gaps in their community’s support for safety. It asks a series of yes or no questions on the policies, practices, and resources that support each of the eight components of the Fire & Life Safety Ecosystem, delivering a score of green (excellent), yellow (good), fair (orange), or red (poor) along with a downloadable report. The Ecosystem Assessment Tool is available in English, Spanish, and Arabic. We invite safety professionals to log-on, choose their language, and assess their community.

Take the assessment

Health of the Ecosystem

Tragic incidents worldwide continue to underscore the need to prioritize fire and life safety in policymaking and invest in a complete fire prevention and protection infrastructure.

2021 Ecosystem Year in Review

2021: The Year in Review

By examining the events outlined in the 2021 Year in Review report, communities can see the fault lines that enabled each calamity and use the examples to help address fractures in their own fire and life safety ecosystems to create safer areas to live.

Read the report
Ecosystem Year in Review report references

2021 References

This document contains more information on the incidents, facts, and figures described in the 2021 Year in Review report.

Download
Ecosystem Year in Review in Spanish - 2021

2021: The Year in Review (Spanish)

This latest edition looks at the tragedies, losses, and successes of the past year, and where attention and resources are needed to improve safety across the globe.

Read the report
Ecosystem Year in Review in Arabic - 2021

2021: The Year in Review (Arabic)

This new edition provides examples of tragic events, losses, and some successes of the past year, and highlights where resources are needed to help improve safety across the globe.

Read the report
Ecosystem Year in Review - 2020

2020: The Year in Review

The 2020 report examines the year’s most notable ecosystem failures, successes, and lessons learned and serves as a valuable asset for informing policymakers, authorities having jurisdiction, and others on what decisions to make for a safer future.

Read the report
Ecosystem Year in Review in Arabic - 2020

2020: The Year in Review (Arabic)

This 2020 report takes a look at the year's most notable ecosystem failures, successes, and lessons learned. It serves as an important asset for policymakers, authorities having jurisdiction, and other community leaders who support community safety.

Read the report

Related resources

  • Video - Use the Ecosystem animated video above when meeting with staff, your peers, colleagues, and other industry professionals. Share the link.
  • Powerpoint - Use the Fire & Life Safety Ecosystem PowerPoint deck (ppt) when making presentations or engaging in conversation with staff, your peers, colleagues, and other industry professionals with whom you interact. Just pick and choose the slides and the information you need from the original deck template.
  • Fact sheet - Download this fact sheet (PDF) to learn more about NFPA and the Fire & Life Safety Ecosystem.
  • Postcard - Be a vocal advocate. Help promote, implement, and enforce the full Fire & Life Safety Ecosystem. Our postcard is a great way to share the information. Download the front and back.
  • Report: Fire Safety in the United States Since 1980

From NFPA Journal®
  • Ecosystem Watch  - NFPA Journal outlines recent success and failures
  • Burn Treatment - Deadly hospital fires are frequent occurrences around the world. Experts say economic globalization is driving new approaches that could change that, 2020
  • Brazil Burning - Experts say a hospital fire and other blazes in Rio de Janeiro serve as prime examples of breakdowns in the NFPA Fire & Life Safety Ecosystem, 2019
  • Weak Links - Decades of neglecting key aspects of the Fire & Life Safety Ecosystem have resulted in devastating wildfires. Can we change? 2019
  • Sprinklers, state code amendments, and the safety ecosystem, 2019
  • Delayed Response: Two years after the Grenfell Tower fire, thousands of buildings in the UK, and possibly worldwide, remain at risk from combustible exterior wall assemblies. Experts say that shouldn’t come as a shock, 2019
  • Safety Delayed: Why it’s time for elected officials to take the pleas of special interests with a grain of salt and trust in the code adoption process, 2018