Forest fire losses close to Rp 200b

JAKARTA (JP): At least 63,000 hectares of forest and brush along East Kalimantan's Mahakam River have been ravaged by fires over the last two months, causing close to Rp 200 billion (US$21 million) in losses.

Speaking from the forestry ministry's fire-fighting command post here yesterday, Director General of Forest Protection and Nature Conservation Soemarsono said the losses excluded biodiversity damage.

"It's still a rough figure... it (the figure) is derived from multiplying each hectare of forest burned with the rehabilitation cost of Rp 5 million per hectare," he said.

Last year, as many as 30,000 hectares of forest and brush in East Kalimantan were destroyed in fires which raged from April to December, with total losses put at Rp 100 billion.

Soemarsono said more than 60 percent of all areas of forest ravaged this year were owned by timber estates and forest concession companies.

There have been no complaints about haze from neighboring countries such as Brunei Darussalam, which is located closest to burning areas in East Kalimantan, he said.

As of last year, the resulting haze from forest fires in Kalimantan and Sumatra spread to neighboring Malaysia and Singapore, causing at least $300 million and $60 million in losses respectively.

Haze from last year's fires, which destroyed at least 300,000 hectares of forest and brush, caused more than Rp 1 billion in damages.

Soemarsono said yesterday that ditches stretching 120 kilometers in length were dug to contain the fires, and small aircraft were being deployed to waterbomb the fires.

So far, as many as 12 sorties of waterbombing have been concluded, Soemarsono said without elaborating on how many fires had been extinguished since the steps were taken.

Director General of Inventory and Forest Land Use, Sumahadi, who accompanied Soemarsono yesterday, said the government had allocated Rp 18 billion in the 1998/1999 state budget -- to take effect on April 1 -- to fight fires.

As many as 167 tons of rice have been pledged by the Indonesian Forestry Society (MPI) to help alleviate the suffering of local people affected by the fires and haze, Sumahadi said. (gis/aan)