Subject: BIOD: Hell on Earth as Borneo's Forest Burn

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Forest Networking a Project of Ecological Enterprises
     http://forests.org/

8/27/97
OVERVIEW & COMMENTARY by EE
What goes around comes around, as the heavily impacted rainforests of 
Borneo are now afire.  Asia's rapidly diminishing rainforests have 
taken another hit as forest fires rage out of control in Indonesian 
Borneo, causing large sections of both Indonesia and Malaysia to be 
covered with thick blankets of smoke.  After two decades of highly 
intensive forest clearing (In 1966, 82% of Indonesia was covered by 
primary forest, now it is 55%), remaining forests are fragmented and 
the micro-climate has changed enough to tip the balance towards 
greater probability of cataclysmic fires.  Fire is merely finishing 
the ecosystem destruction that out of control industrial logging 
started.  As Asian style industrial logging crests in Papua New 
Guinea, and enters the last great forest wildernesses in Brazil, 
Africa and now Siberia, we can expect more of the same.  The World 
needs its remaining large and wild forest ecosystems, and by the time 
the logs are carted away and what remains is burning, it is too late.
g.b.

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Title:   Hell on earth: forests burn and nature chokes
Source:  Sydney Morning Herald
Status:  Copyright, contact source for permission to reprint
Date:    August 23, 1997
Byline:  Louise Williams

The burning rainforests of Borneo are only the latest chapter in the 
tragic history of wholesale destruction in South-East Asia's "lungs'. 
Herald Correspondent LOUISE WILLIAMS reports from Jakarta.

FROM the air, the great rainforests of Borneo have disappeared under 
billowing clouds of smoke from hundreds of forest fires raging out of 
control, forcing planes to abandon their attempts to land.

On the ground, cars and motorbikes are picking their way through the 
eerie gloom, their headlights blazing, pedestrians are clutching wet 
towels to their faces and visibility has fallen to as little as 50 
metres.

Thousands of kilometres away, the high-rises of Kuala Lumpur are 
shrouded in thick haze and residents have been advised to wear
surgical masks and stop exercising outdoors as the smoke from western 
Indonesia's burning forests drifts northwards.

Already Indonesian forestry officials estimate that at least 16,000 
hectares of one of the world's most important rainforest tracts is on 
fire in eight provinces on the islands of Borneo, Sumatra, Sulawesi 
and Maluku. Indonesian officials have announced a "maximum alert", but 
have insufficient equipment or expertise to do much more than watch 
the fires burn. The smoke is fast becoming a diplomatic issue as 
Singapore and Malaysia choke under the haze, and the destruction of 
large tracts of rainforest is further damaging the vulnerable 
ecosystems of Asia's rapidly shrinking "lungs".

Since the early 1980s, when logging companies accelerated their 
operations in the world's second-largest rainforest reserves in
Sumatra and Kalimantan, on the island of Borneo, forest fires have 
become an increasingly serious regional health and pollution issue. 
Visually, the smoke is causing aviation chaos but more worrying is the 
impact of particulate pollution, which is being blamed for respiratory 
illnesses, eye irritations and asthma, especially in children.

In their natural state, tropical forests hold vast quantities of 
moisture from heavy wet season rains, which support them through
the hot, dry months. But relentless logging, as well as nomadic slash 
and burn cultivation, has already drastically altered the topography 
of much of Borneo and Sumatra, leaving vast areas denuded, shrinking 
critical watershed areas and reducing dense, towering forests to 
kindling.

Dry season burning off to prepare for rice planting, as well as the 
use of fires to clear land and dispose of wood offcuts, engulf 
Indonesia and its northern neighbours in a choking haze almost every 
year.

This year, Indonesia is facing a severe drought and already experts 
have predicted a long hot dry season due to the El Nino weather 
pattern. "There are no clouds in the sky but it is almost dark in the 
middle of the day because of the smoke," said one visitor to 
Samarinda, on Kalimantan's east coast, who has been unable to travel 
further inland.

"The planes haven't been able to fly for a week and people are really 
worried," said Jailani, a Samarinda resident.

He said the city had only two weeks' supply of clean water because 
logging operations had denuded much of the watershed, which meant wet 
season rains drained quickly out to sea. Lakes and ponds, previously 
fed by the slow leeching of the wet season rains through the forests, 
had now dried up.

"Nowadays if you travel even 500 kilometres upstream you cannot see 
primary forest. It has all been cut. If we don't get rain within two 
weeks we will have nothing left to drink."

Forestry experts say the usually moist rainforests have become 
vulnerable to fire due to a process of "conversion" caused by
logging and clearing. Opening up rainforests introduces sunlight to 
the forest floor, which was previously shaded by the dense tropical 
canopy. Sunlight encourages potentially flammable grasses and shrubs 
to invade the tropical forest, and they are easily ignited during 
burn-offs.

At the same time, clear felling of rainforest areas encourages the 
rapid growth of grasses which become brittle and dry during the hot 
months and are highly flammable.

Earlier this week the Indonesian national airline, Garuda, attempted 
to fly to Pontianak in West Kalimantan but was forced back to Jakarta. 
All regional airlines later announced cancellations across Kalimantan 
and parts of Sumatra where towns were no longer visible from the air 
and the sight range was well below the minimum 2,000 metres.

In 1966, 82 per cent of Indonesia's total land mass was covered by 
primary forest. By 1982 the area had shrunk to 68 per cent and recent 
satellite photographs indicate forest cover is now about 55 per cent, 
including timber plantations. About 64 million hectares, or one-third 
of Indonesia's total land mass, is covered by commercial logging 
concessions.

Last year Indonesia became the world's biggest plywood exporter, 
according to official statistics, and more than 30 per cent of
all concessions are controlled by 10 companies with close political 
links to the Soeharto Government.

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