Lost in a haze again<\/p>\n
At long last, the authorities seem to be taking action to halt
\nthe further spread of the wildfires that have already upset
\nflight schedules and threatened the health of whole populations
\nin a number of regions here, as well as wreaking havoc in
\nneighboring countries.<\/p>\n
Over the weekend, authorities in Riau province were reported
\nto have taken an executive of a local plantation company into
\ncustody on suspicion of ordering people to clear several
\nthousands of hectares of land by burning. In addition, two local
\ndistrict administrators were questioned by police over their
\nalleged roles in the crime.<\/p>\n
These steps are none too soon, given that the so-called \"hot
\nspots\" seen by satellite imaging in Riau province alone reached
\ninto the thousands during the past week. So serious and recurring
\nhas the haze problem become that the authorities in Malaysia have
\nthreatened to raise the issue at the ASEAN regional level. The
\nexasperation on the part of the Malaysian authorities is easy to
\nunderstand. Haze coming from fires in Riau has in the past days
\nblanketed the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur and is
\nthreatening to adversely affect that country's tourist industry.<\/p>\n
To be sure, clearing land by burning is nothing new in
\nIndonesia. Lacking modern tools to make the job of land clearing
\nfaster and easier, indigenous populations on many of the islands
\nof this vast archipelago have for generations resorted to what
\nsociologists and agricultural experts refer to as slash-and-burn
\nland clearing.<\/p>\n
Some experts hold that aside from saving much of the manual
\nlabor that would otherwise be necessary, this method also helps
\nto improve the fertility of the land thus cleared, at least in
\nthe short term. One drawback to this technique, however, is that
\nafter the fertility of the land has been exhausted, the farmers
\nare compelled to move on to a new plot of land, where the same
\nprocess is repeated, over and over again.<\/p>\n
Many experts, however, consider this traditional manner of
\nclearing land for personal use to be relatively harmless because
\nonly small plots of land are involved, and is nothing compared to
\nthe wholesale burning of thousands of hectares of land at a time
\nfor commercial purposes. According to one estimate, Indonesia is
\nlosing some there million hectares of forest and uncultivated
\nland every year to slash-and-burn farming.<\/p>\n
Given the serious health and economic problems caused by the
\nhaze from these fires, it is surprising that so little has so far
\nbeen done to take on the issue in earnest. A wildfire on a
\nmassive scale, after all, was reported for the first time here in
\nthe early 1980s, when fires burning in Kalimantan sent veils of
\nsmoke over neighboring Singapore and Malaysia.<\/p>\n
Forest fires have since occurred almost annually in growing
\nnumbers on several islands, especially Kalimantan and Sumatra.
\nNeither have Singapore and Malaysia been the only victims of the
\nresulting haze. Thick smoke upset flight schedules at Sultan
\nSyarif Kasim airport in Pekanbaru, Riau's provincial capital,
\nduring the past week and, more recently, spreading forest fires
\nhave threatened to surround the West Kalimantan provincial
\ncapital of Pontianak.<\/p>\n
So far, it has seemed that the authorities are more or less
\npowerless to contain the problem, simply relying on rain to put
\nout the fires. Last week's police action against people suspected
\nof having some responsibility for the fires in Riau, however,
\nshows that something can certainly be done, as long as the
\nauthorities have the will and the courage to act.<\/p>\n
Of course, educating local populations in areas vulnerable to
\nwildfires about the importance of keeping their environments
\nintact -- for their own good -- remains the most important effort
\nthat must be taken. Nevertheless, the actions taken over the
\nweekend by the authorities in Riau deserve to be commended.<\/p>",
"url": "https:\/\/jawawa.id\/newsitem\/lost-in-a-haze-again-1447893297",
"image": ""
},
"sponsor": "Okusi Associates",
"sponsor_url": "https:\/\/okusiassociates.com"
}