fire management Archives - Resilient Landscapes

Reducing forest degradation by managing bushfires in The Gambia

Key findings:

Over 90% of bushfires in the Gambia are aggravated by human activities such as fuelwood and charcoal production, forest and farm clearing activities, pests and disease control, smoking, and increased fuel loads that accelerate fire spread
Bushfires affect half of the Gambia forests, which are estimated at 423,000 hectares (about 47% of total land area), with 70% of them facing one or more forms of degradation
In The Gambia, precipitation patterns are critical predictors of bushfire occurrence. Bushfires are highest during the dry and hot seasons and lowest during the rainy/wet seasons
There is a wide human and institutional capacity gap in bushfire management in the Gambia, including an inadequate number of well-trained personnel, inadequate equipment and resources to suppress bushfires, inadequate communications and coordination on wildfire management, and lack of incentives towards preventing, suppressing and recovering after bushfires.

Characterising policy responses to complex socio-ecological problems: 60 fire management interventions in Indonesian peatlands

Governance of complex socio-ecological problems such as climate change, deforestation, and chronic wildfires is becoming “messier”. Theory and case study evidence suggest that “messy” institutional characteristics like non- government involvement and multi-level decision-making can improve social and environmental outcomes. However, these characteristics still lack systematic documentation, and there have been few efforts to systematically characterize and compare the interventions associated with them. We examined 60 fire management interventions (FMI) undertaken between 1999 and 2016 in response to Indonesia’s disastrous peatland fires. We documented their institutional characteristics (i.e., lead sector, multi-level character) and compared their design across institutional types, focusing on design attributes associated with performance such as targeting to high-risk soil types, landholders, and time periods, and the use and design of incentives. We found gaps between scientific recommendations and practice when it came to intervention targeting. However, industry FMI were more likely to employ nuanced targeting among landholders. Government, industry, and civil society adopted differing intervention strategies, including notable differences in the design of incentives. These findings provide the groundwork for research comparing intervention outcomes between institutional types. They also highlight the need for further stock-taking to inform research in these areas.

National Wildfire Management Strategy and Action Plan: 2024-2034

This National Wildfire Management Strategy outlines how wildfires in the Gambia can be addressed. It details the major aggravators of wildfires and provides key strategic objectives that, if well delivered, can significantly reduce the recurrence of wildfires. The development of this strategy is a significant milestone at the national and regional levels as it establishes a solid policy foundation for mainstreaming wildfire management in different ministries and line departments. It provides a basic overview of wildfire management, its evolution, potential, and wildfire-related policies and initiatives in The Gambia.

Report on Capacity Development Needs and Gap Analysis – Annexes

This document is an Annex to the Report on Capacity Development Needs and Gap Analysis – Main Report. The document was prepared to assist in the planning and implementation of the regional programme “Measurable Action for Haze-Free Sustainable Land Management in Southeast Asia (MAHFSA)” Capacity Development Needs and Gap Analysis under Component 1 – Enhancement of data, information and results management system and operational capacity.

Report on Capacity Development Needs and Gap Analysis – Main Report

The Capacity Development Need and Gap Analysis (CDNGA) was prepared to assess the regional and national capacity in implementing the ASEAN Peatland Management Strategy (APMS) and the Roadmap on ASEAN Cooperation towards Transboundary Haze Pollution Control with Means of Implementation (also known as ASEAN Haze-Free Roadmap), as well as the use of available information and results management system for monitoring and reducing transboundary haze pollution in the region, then to build capacity and enhance data, information and results management systems for sustainable peatland management and haze control.

A stocktaking of knowledge products on peatlands, fires and haze in Southeast Asia, 1990 to 2020

One key activity of MAHFSA is to stocktake existing knowledge products and develop and deploy the knowledge products related to peatlands and fires in Southeast Asia. The stocktake analysis synthesises existing knowledge products by categorising them into five thematic areas policies, tenure, economics, best practices, and monitoring. It also classified knowledge products based on geographical location, focusing on the country and regional levels. Moreover, the study categorises the knowledge products based on the elements of integrated fire management, from prevention, preparedness, suppression, and recovery. By applying text and co-occurrence analyses, the study highlights salient topics of the knowledge products related to peatlands in Southeast Asia. The result shows that thematic areas and knowledge product types vary between ASEAN member states.

Humans and climate modulate fire activity across Ethiopia

Fire occurrence is influenced by interactions between human activity, climate, and fuels that are difficult to disentangle but crucial to understand, given fire’s role in carbon dynamics, deforestation, and habitat maintenance, alteration, or loss. To determine the relative balance of climatic and anthropogenic influences on fire activity, we quantified interannual variability in burned area across Ethiopia from 2001 to 2018 and developed a statistical model to assess climate and human factors contributing to patterns of area burned. Annual burned area declined nationally and within several regions from 2001 to 2018 and was closely related to climate, particularly antecedent temperature. Of the area that burned at least once, 62% reburned at 1–3-year intervals and the geographic region of frequent-fire areas did not shift over time. Despite increased enforcement of a fire ban over the past 20 years, no strong spatiotemporal shifts in fire occurrence patterns were detected at a national level. Our results suggest that human influence combined with dynamics of vegetation and fuels strongly influenced fire occurrence in Ethiopia, indicating that geographic variation in cultural fire practices was highly influential and relatively unchanging between 2001 and 2018. In contrast, interannual variability in total burned area was strongly related to climate and the influence of climate on fuel abundance. Our results highlight that climate can strongly influence short-term variability in fire activity even as longer-term patterns may depend more strongly on human influence.

Fire management in Ethiopia: past, present, and future

Apart from natural fire cycles in the lowlands and midlands, the past two decades have seen severe wildfires in ecosystems with little or no fire history. Frequency and intensity appear to be increasing with climate change and drought. The emphasis has been on emergency responses, but this must be coupled with more sustainable land use policies, land use plans and practices, and effective sectoral coordination. However, there is no national strategy, and local actors and community members lack capacity to participate. A new, integrated fire management system needs to incorporate real-time early warning and reporting mechanisms, with suitable financing and adequate equipment. Aims-an integrated fire management system For effective forest fire prevention, detection, management and control, this program will develop a strategy that guides the establishment of an integrated, evidence-based national system anchored in multilevel and multistakeholder governance. This will include mechanisms for coordination across sectors and levels of government, with the active participation of resource users, smallholder farmers, pastoralists and the private sector. The Ethiopian Forest Development and the Environmental Protection Agency have formally endorsed the approach and will ensure operationalization. Participatory approaches-to addressing knowledge, capacity and institutional gaps Comprehensive stakeholder mapping identified relevant actors across sectors and levels.

Towards an integrated wildfire management system in Ethiopia. Review of experiences and gaps, and MODIS databased identification of patterns and hotspot areas

Wildfires have been recognized as global environmental processes and ecosystems differ in their sensitivity and response to natural fires depending on their fire history and vegetation characteristics. Most wildfires particularly in the tropics are human induced. In the tropics, traditional use of fire for agriculture and rangeland management has shaped rural landscapes for long. In Ethiopia, it is widely believed that seasonal wildfires have become more frequent, widespread and impact forest resources and livelihoods. The absence of a national fire management system is seriously undermining the nation’s green growth policies, strategies, and ongoing initiatives (e.g., Reducing Emission from Deforestation and forest Degradation (REDD+), Afforestation and reforestation (A/R) and the Green Legacy Initiative (GLI)). If not addressed, this may even reverse the gains so far made.

Key Points of the ASEAN Guidelines on Peatland Fire Management

This set of key points is extracted from the original guidelines and management practices on peatland fire management was developed at a joint workshop held in Singapore in 2015, comprising ASEAN Member State representatives, with the objective of providing a set of strategies to mitigate fires in peatland ecosystems, and the ambition of eventually overcoming them. They were subsequently adopted by the Conference of the Parties to the ASEAN Agreement on Transboundary Haze Pollution (COP AATHP) on 29 October 2015 in Hanoi, Viet Nam.

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