Riau Ignores Haze Worry, Let Farmers Burn

By Amy Chew

INDONESIAN forest fires are not expected to let up this year, with a new by-law in the Riau province allowing farmers to burn up to two hectares of their land.

The controversial by-law contradicts national law, which bans open burning of forests to clear land except by indigenous people.

“The by-law came out in June. It allows the public (farmers) to burn two hectares of land,” Bambang Hero Saharjo, a government fire investigator, told the New Straits Times in a telephone interview.

Bambang is also the head of the Forest and Land Fire Laboratory at Bogor Agricultural University.

“Since the enactment of the law, I have seen an increase in smallholders burning their land.”

According to Bambang, the government’s efforts last year to educate the people not to set fires have gone to waste.

“I feel very sad about this. We made a lot of effort, teaching people not to burn the land and how to clear the land by chopping down trees,” said Bambang.

“Whatever gains we have made to reduce forest fires last year have been negated by this by-law.

“As such, I don’t see fires decreasing this year. The level of fires will remain the same as in 2006,” said Bambang.

For the last 20 years, smoke from forest fires in Indonesia has blown across the Straits of Malacca to Malaysia and Singapore, smothering parts of the two countries in a choking haze during the annual dry season.

According to Bambang, fires have broken out in the giant Riau province in Sumatra and in central Kalimantan.

“Central Kalimantan was already blanketed by smog two days ago although the smog is not very thick.

“I expect this smog to spread to West Kalimantan soon,” said Bambang.

Indonesia is calculated to release two billion tonnes of carbon dioxide per annum, mostly from the burning of the country’s massive peat lands – unlike the United States and China, where greenhouse gasses arise from fossil fuel burning.

Carbon dioxide emissions have been blamed for global warming, which is expected to increase droughts and floods and cause sea levels to rise.

Peat land contains carbon accumulated thousands of years ago. Indonesian peat lands are estimated to contain 125 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide.

“The biggest problem is that the burning land in Riau and Central Kalimantan is peat land,” said Bambang.

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