Return of haze feared as Indonesian forest fires reach ‘alarming conditions’
Hazy days may return to Malaysia after it was reported today that hundreds of hectares of forest in Indonesia's Riau province have been ravaged by fire, reaching "alarming conditions", according to the Jakarta Post.
The English-language daily reported that a lack of rainfall made fire-fighting efforts more difficult, and thin haze has already blanketed Dumai and Pekanbaru, Riau's capital.
“Firefighters experienced difficulties extinguishing the flames as the area is dried peatland,” Riau's Meranti Islands regency forestry agency head M. Murod was quoted as saying.
Fires have been burning since last week in the regency, and have spread to Rangsang Island and Tebingtinggi Island, destroying about 200 hectares of land.
Murod hoped Jakarta would help the efforts by arranging for cloud seeding to avoid a repeat of the haze which struck neighbouring countries.
In June last year, schools in Singapore and Malaysia were shut and state of emergency declared in several areas in Johor after the Air Pollution Index (API) crossed 700.
An API rate between 0 to 50 is considered as good, 51-100 as moderate, 101-200 as unhealthy, 201-300 very unhealthy, and above 300 as hazardous.
In the past, the dry season, between May and September, was blamed for the haze, as well as on Indonesian farmers who did land clearing for the planting season.
The haze last year had also sparked a war of words between Jakarta and officials from Malaysia and Singapore, after an Indonesian minister said Sinaporean and Malaysian companies were to blame for forest-clearing activities.
Murod said he could not identify the plantations involved in the latest fires.
“The blaze is getting bigger and bigger inside the plantations. It’s difficult to identify. I have just received a report on losses suffered by residents,” he said, as reported by the Jakarta Post.
Bengkalis regency's Disaster and Firefighter Agency head Mohammad Jalal meanwhile did not rule out land clearing activities for the latest fires.
“We have often warned about avoiding fire in peatland. In the current hot weather and strong winds, the dried peatland could easily burn and it’s difficult to extinguish,” he told the Jakarta Post. – February 3, 2014.
