Most haze events have resulted from
smoke from fires that occurred on
peatlands in
Sumatra and the
Kalimantan region of
Borneo island. Poor accountability and transparency of Indonesian agricultural companies, and limited political and economic
incentives to hold companies to account, have been identified as key barriers to mitigating the issue. Undisturbed humid
tropical forests are considered to be very resistant to fire, experiencing rare fires only during extraordinary dry periods. A study published in 2005 concluded that there is no single dominant cause of fire in a particular site and there are wide differences in the causes of fires in different sites. The study identified the following direct and indirect causes of fire: •
Direct causes of fire • Fire as a tool in
land clearing • Fire as a weapon in
land tenure or land use disputes • Accidental or escaped fires • Fire connected with
resource extraction •
Indirect causes of fire • Land tenure and land use allocation conflicts and competition •
Forest degrading practices • Economic incentives/disincentives • Population growth and migration • Inadequate
fire fighting and management capacity
Fire as a tool in land clearing Fire is the cheapest and fastest method to clear land in preparation for planting. Fire is used to clear the plant material left over from
logging or old crops. Mechanically raking the plant material into long piles and letting them rot over time, is expensive and slow, and could harbour
pests. Clearing land with machines and chemicals can cost up to US$200 per hectare while using fire costs US$5 per hectare. After a
peat swamp forest has been cleared and drained, the
peat soil is still unsuitable for agriculture, because peat soil is nutrient-poor and acidic (pH 3 - 4). To make the soil suitable for agriculture, the pH has to be
neutralised and nutrients added. Pests and plant diseases also have to be removed. One method is to use chemicals such as
limestone to neutralise the
acidity, as well as
fertilisers and
pesticides. This method costs about Rupiah 30 - 40 million per hectare. Alternatively, fire is used to clear the plant material left over from logging. The fire kills pests and the resulting
ash serves to fertilise the soil and neutralise the acidity. This method costs Rupiah 2 million per hectare.
Land conflicts In
Indonesia, the Basic Forestry Law grants the
Ministry of Forestry authority over all land classified as
forests. Approximately 49% of the nation (909,070 square kilometres) is covered by actual forest, although the government classifies 69% of the land area (1,331,270 square kilometres) as forest. The land rights of
traditional communities that live on land classified as forest cannot be registered and are generally unrecognised by the state. Therefore, these communities do not really have the ability to enforce rules at the village level and exclude outsiders such as oil palm plantations, logging companies, residents of other villages, migrants, small-scale loggers or transmigrants. Competing claims in turn leads to land conflicts. As the number of new, external actors increases, so does the likelihood that fire will be used as a weapon.
Role of peat A
peatland is an area where organic material such as leaves and twigs had accumulated naturally under waterlogged conditions in the last 10,000 years. This layer of organic material, known as
peat, can be up to 20m deep. Indonesia has 265,500 km2 of peatland, which comprises 13.9% of its land area. Malaysia also has significant peatland in the
Peninsular and
Borneo, at 26,685 km2, covering 8.1% of its land area. Although originally a
wetland ecosystem, much of the peatland in Southeast Asia have been drained for human activities such as agriculture, forestry and urban development. A report published in 2011 stated that more than 30% of peat swamp forests had been converted to agricultural land and a further 30% had been logged or degraded in the past 20 to 30 years. Excessive drainage in peat results in the top layer of peat drying out. Due to its high carbon content, dry peat is extremely susceptible to burning, especially during the dry season. Peat fires often smoulder underground for months even despite surface rain. Studies have shown that
peat fires are a major contributor to the haze. In 2009, around 40% of all fires in Peninsular Malaysia, Borneo, Sumatra and Java were detected in peatlands, even though they cover only 10% of the land area studied. == History ==