THE forests of Indonesia are burning again. Last year鈥檚 conflagration, the
most expensive bonfire in history, was briefly doused by monsoon rains in
December. But with the rains faltering early in the new year, the country鈥檚
farmers and plantation owners have wasted no time in resuming their torching of
the world鈥檚 second largest region of rainforest.
The normally humid jungles of Indonesia are now tinder-dry, and as the
climate aberration known as El Ni帽o goes into its second year, the
drought looks set to continue. 鈥淓veryone is taking advantage of the unusually
dry conditions to set fires to clear land,鈥� says Ron Lilley of the World Wide
Fund for Nature (WWF) in Indonesia, who has visited the heart of the new fires.
鈥淭here is so much dead wood around, much of it from trees killed by last year鈥檚
fires, that I am afraid this year鈥檚 fires will be even worse.鈥�
Last year, as the fires were at their height, Indonesia鈥檚 President Suharto
called for the deliberate burning to stop. But the appeal rang hollow, as many
of his government鈥檚 policies lead directly to large-scale forest clearance.
Right now Indonesia is encouraging plantation owners to double the area of land
under oil palms. Large areas of the peat bog forest of central Kalimantan on the
island of Borneo鈥攖he source of much of the smoke from last year鈥檚
fires鈥攈ave been earmarked for conversion to rice growing. And with
government policy keeping timber prices low, it is cheaper to burn the cleared
trees than to harvest them.
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Some Indonesian politicians and foreign advisers are trying to prevent
another disaster, but they face an uphill struggle. 鈥淔ire is used to clear the
land because it is quick and cheap,鈥� says David Wall, the director of a project
funded by the European Union to advise the Indonesian government on how to
prevent forest fires from spreading. Indonesia鈥檚 landowners, like bad suburban
neighbours, seem set to create another bonfire to choke Southeast Asia this
summer.
Many outsiders have called for a ban on all burning in the forests. But local
forest scientists disagree. Burning is not necessarily bad, says Jeff Sayer,
director-general of the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR),
based in Bogor, 60 kilometres south of Jakarta. 鈥淏urning is a legitimate land
management practice. In some ways it is preferable to other land clearing
methods,鈥� says Sayer. A report on alternatives to slash and burn written late
last year by a group of Indonesian researchers with CIFOR and the International
Centre for Research in Agroforestry (ICRAF) pointed out that 鈥渇ire eliminates
field debris, slows regrowth of weeds, reduces pest and disease problems, adds
fertiliser in the form of ash, and loosens the soil to make planting
别补蝉颈别谤.鈥�
The problem, Sayer says, is not burning itself but 鈥渋ndustrial burning鈥� to
clear land for plantations. 鈥淪lash and burn,鈥� the report on alternatives says,
鈥渨orked well for smallhold farmers for centuries because communities regulated
the use of fires.鈥� But that is not the sort of farming that dominates in
Indonesia today. Much of the country has been turned into a 鈥渨ild east鈥�, where
swathes of forest are being cleared to make way for plantations of export crops,
ranging from monoculture stands of timber to rubber trees and oil palms. 鈥淭he
past two or three years have seen an explosion in land clearing in Sumatra and
Kalimantan for large-scale agricultural and forestry plantations,鈥� says
Wall.
The plan to double the area of land under oil palms to 5.5 million hectares
by the year 2000 will involve clearing an area of forest the size of Wales. The
government is also engaged in parallel pushes to maintain self-sufficiency in
rice production for its 200 million people, and to keep the country a leading
exporter of plywood and wood pulp. All these require the clearance of large
tracts of forest. 鈥淪hifting cultivators burn one hectare, but plantation owners
burn a thousand hectares at a time,鈥� says Emy Hafild, director of WALHI, a
coalition of Indonesia鈥檚 largest environment groups.
According to the WWF, in the weeks after Suharto had exhorted companies to
stop setting fires, 鈥渙ver a thousand new hot spots were identified on satellite
images, each responsible for fire over an average of 200 hectares鈥�. The WWF
argues that many of the fires were 鈥渄eliberate acts of defiance鈥� by companies
intent on meeting the agreed targets for land clearance.
Going for the burn
Tom Tomich, a natural resource economist with the ICRAF, who is also based in
Bogor, identifies three types of fire: 鈥淭hose set to clear land, those that
accidentally got out of control, and those that were started deliberately as a
weapon in social conflict.鈥� Lilley says that 鈥渕uch of what is burnt is due to
accidental spreading of fires because management is poor.鈥� But sometimes the
spread may not be accidental.
In many parts of the forest, the government is giving the big plantation
companies concessions to clear and plant areas of forest that have traditionally
been occupied and farmed by tribal groups and smallholders. 鈥淪ome fires are
deliberately left to get out of control to drive the small farmers out,鈥� says
Lilley. In retaliation, smallholders may burn trees planted by the interlopers.
In this atmosphere of conflict, 鈥渇ire is a powerful weapon for both planters and
farmers鈥�, says Pedro Sanchez, director-general of ICRAF.
Government ministers accept that plantation owners, industrial estates and
government-sponsored transmigration land-clearing projects were responsible for
80 per cent of last year鈥檚 fires. But whoever starts them, fires running out of
control have destroyed farms and areas rich in wildlife, burnt settlements, and
laid siege even to large towns.
The weather can take part of the blame. The islands of Indonesia are usually
at the centre of a zone of intense convection currents, updrafts of hot air that
create storm clouds. But during El Ni帽o years, when winds and ocean
currents across the equatorial Pacific are reversed, this pattern breaks down.
The waters around Indonesia, which are normally the warmest in the world, are
cooled. With their main heat source diminished, the convection currents in the
air above are suppressed. The result is virtually no rain from May to September,
and much less rain than normal during the monsoon season from November to
March.
That has been the meteorological pattern behind major fires in the past two
decades. In 1982 and 1983, when El Ni帽o ran at full intensity into a
second year, fires raged over an estimated 3.7 million hectares of east
Kalimantan鈥攁n area bigger than Belgium. It was one of the most serious,
and least reported, environmental catastrophes of the decade, consuming almost
twice as much forest as last year鈥檚 fires.
Dire predictions
Meteorologists are predicting something similar for 1998. Last year鈥檚 El
Ni帽o, which was the most intense of the century, will continue into the
middle of this year before abating. It has dramatically reduced the rains in the
current monsoon season, with fitful rains in December giving out in Kalimantan
in early January. The scene was set for fires once again to rage through the
forest.
But damage to the rainforest is only a start. For every hectare of burnt
land, a hundred hectares is engulfed by smoke. It was smoke, stretching from
Thailand and the Philippines to New Guinea and the northern coast of Australia,
that turned last year鈥檚 Indonesian fires from a local difficulty into an
international scandal. Smoke affected people鈥檚 health right across the region.
An estimated 40 000 Indonesians suffered respiratory problems and up to a
million people suffered eye irritations. Smoke was to blame for the shipping and
plane crashes that killed close to 300 people. And smoke was responsible for
most of the economic cost of the fires, which the WWF puts at around $20
billion. Tourist bookings in Southeast Asia fell by a third, and one estimate
put the lost business to the Malaysian national airline alone at $2
billion.
So why was there much more smoke this time than in past fires. Fire is normal
in the forest, even in wet years. 鈥淯sually it dissipates quickly and there are
no complaints,鈥� says Wall. Again, some of the blame can be laid at El
Ni帽o鈥檚 door. Because it damps down normal convection currents, it traps
smoke close to the ground. But that still leaves the question of why the fires
in the El Ni帽o years of 1982 and 1983 burnt more forest than last year鈥檚
and yet produced much less smoke and far less international concern.
The answer can be found in satellite images captured during the height of
last year鈥檚 fires. They show that the two most intense sources of smoke were
burning peat bogs in central Kalimantan and the Riau area of Sumatra. It was the
burning of these bogs, rather than the overall extent of the fires, that led to
the intense smoke in neighbouring countries.
These peat bogs are Indonesia鈥檚 last major undeveloped area, says ecologist
Jack Rieley of the University of Nottingham, who has spent the past five years
doing research in the swamps of central Kalimantan. 鈥淭he bogs are flooded for
most of the year,鈥� he says, 鈥渁nd for this reason do not have permanent human
settlements.鈥� The forested freshwater swamps contain important commercial tree
species such as meranti as well as specialised swamp vegetation able to absorb
oxygen through roots in flooded ground. They are important breeding grounds for
fish, some of them endemic species, and refuges for rare reptiles and mammals
including, says Rieley, possibly 2000 endangered orang-utan.
Now that is changing. In 1995, Suharto announced plans to clear a million
hectares of forested peat bog鈥攁n area almost as big as
Yorkshire鈥攔ound the provincial town of Palangkaraya in central Kalimantan
and turn it into rice paddy. 鈥淕igantic canals are being constructed across the
vast peatland landscapes for drainage and to provide irrigation for the rice
fields,鈥� says Rieley.
The peat in these bogs, laid down in the 10 000 years since the end of the
last ice age, is in many places 20 metres deep. These massive stores of organic
material can burn for years, producing much more smoke than a conventional
forest fire. For three months last year, Palangkaraya was a twilight world of
fires and thick smog. University students had to organise firefighting teams to
prevent the blaze spreading through their campus. Even in late October, when
smoke had cleared from much of the rest of the region, visibility in the city
remained at 5 metres. Today, says Lilley, most of the central Kalimantan peat
forest is burnt and black. In many places the skeletons of trees remain,
鈥渓eafless, with trunks charred up to two metres but with all the roots
destroyed鈥�. Beneath the surface, the fires smoulder on.
While little can be done to influence El Ni帽o, disastrous fires are
not inevitable. 鈥淪imple and inexpensive changes in forestry practices can
greatly reduce fire risks in logged forests,鈥� says Sayer. Part of the problem is
the vast amount of dead wood left behind when forests are cleared. Even if it is
not deliberately torched, this detritus swiftly dries in the sun, ready to be
ignited by the slightest spark. It needs to be removed by other means. One
possibility, says Sayer, might be to accelerate decomposition of waste wood.
Another is to chip or shred it for mulching.
Sayer and Sanchez advocate a licensing system under which large companies
would have to obtain a permit before using fire to clear the land. There would
have to be additional restrictions during El Ni帽o years and perhaps a
permanent ban on burning in peat bogs. The government could also tackle
structural features of the economy that encourage fires. For instance, if timber
prices were allowed to rise it would be much more attractive for plantation
companies to harvest forest timber rather than burn it.
Some Indonesian politicians are attempting to tackle these problems. The
environment minister, Sarwono Kusumaatmadja, and the forestry minister,
Djamaludin Suryohadikusumo, are both regarded as having good fire records. Last
year they issued early warnings about the risks of fires, and spoke out against
the perpetrators. Sarwono accused local officials of colluding with companies to
violate Suharto鈥檚 bans on burning. Djamaludin used data from satellite images to
name 176 companies鈥� including some owned by the Suharto
family鈥攔esponsible for the burning.
Playing down the damage
Some other sections of the government are more reluctant to acknowledge the
scale of the problem. As late as last October, government officials were telling
the XIth World Forestry Congress that the blazes had devoured less than 220 000
hectares, and were decrying environmentalists鈥� estimates of 1.7 million hectares
destroyed. But a government-commissioned study, carried out by the WWF and the
Washington DC think-tank the World Resources Institute, has since shown that
even the environmentalists had underestimated the damage. At least 2 million
hectares burnt.
Fear of more bad publicity may make the larger plantation companies more
cautious this year, says Wall. But the burning is not likely to stop. 鈥淭he
problem is that these plantations have very big programmes of new planting or
replanting, and the land clearance is often subcontracted,鈥� says Wall.
Subcontractors 鈥渁re out for a quick buck and are poorly supervised, if at all,鈥�
he says. 鈥淭hey would still risk burning in remote areas even if the total ban on
fires for land clearing is reintroduced.鈥�
Last year, few of Indonesia鈥檚 landowners took serious notice of the
President鈥檚 exhortations to stop the burning. With no measures to back them up,
the pleas were taken to be for international rather than domestic consumption.
This year the picture is made even more complicated by the financial crisis that
has hit Indonesia and other East Asian economies. Will land clearance grind to a
halt as the economy crashes? Or will the land barons and their contractors
simply cut more corners, causing more conflagrations, in an effort to maintain
profits? It will certainly take more than fine words from the President to
quench the fires.
