Examining the price of Indonesia's forest fires

Indonesia's fire and haze: the cost of catastrophe; Edited by David Glover and Timothy Jessup; Institute of Southeast Asian Studies, Singapore, 1999; 149 pages

JAKARTA (JP): One does not need to be a prophet to express the view that the Southeast Asian forest fires and smog -- there is a difference -- of 1997-1998 constituted a very major environmental disaster. Emil Salim, who contributed the foreword to this volume, a former Indonesian environment minister, has no such reputation but he is quick to acknowledge "the damage inflicted was terrible" and on a scale that validates the most pessimistic description.

It is undeniable that the fires of 1997-1998 and their antecedents in 1982-1983 began in Indonesia, and yet when the International Union for the Conservation of Nature issued a report on the early 1980s describing the destruction in East Kalimantan as "the worst single environmental catastrophe of the century" the New Order provincial governor dismissed it all as no big deal. Perhaps it was no wonder with that cynicism and insouciance that the late 1990s were to confirm that no lessons had been learned where they really mattered--in the corridors of power.

However, if one opens this book expecting the contributors to simply beat on the old regime, culpable though it was, with political rods one will be disappointed. David Glover, a Canadian forestry and agriculture expert, cautions against that and insists "the danger that a forest will burn is dependent on the levels of fire hazard and fire risk", and these involve a complex interrelationship of natural and man-made factors. Fire hazard is "a measure of the amount, type and dryness of potential fuel in the forest" while "fire risk is usually related to human activity".

Where the latter involves "burning in close proximity to a place where the fire hazard is high" then major fires are probable.

Indications from charcoal in the soils of Kalimantan show that forests have burned periodically for at least 17,500 years. Why then were these forests not eliminated? Because they are generally remarkably resistant under normal circumstances. However, the forests in 1997-1998 were far from normal with El Nino reducing the rainfall to as little as 10 percent of normal in some parts of the island. The critical difference was provided by heavy fuel loads in logged forests and widespread use of fire for land clearance.

Land use practices changed dramatically with the onset of the New Order. And it was many of the interests connected to it that played a principal part in that change. The swidden agriculture of local peoples played a very minor role.

This volume to which a number of nationalities, Western and Southeast Asian, have contributed examines in clear detail the impact of the 1997-1998 blazes. These were felt as far away as Vietnam, but of course the major impact was on the environment and people of Indonesia.

Because it is partly technical, it is not simply a tale of woe. However, one is left to wonder how much of this has penetrated the corridors of power and affected the political will. The ministries of forestry and environment should try to create real mechanisms to prevent any repetition of these disasters. And this book is a little help.

-- David Jardine