By Fransiska Nangoy
JAKARTA, Oct 22 (Reuters) – Indonesia remains on high alert for wildfires despite a decline in hotspots over the past week, with the sporadic rainfall still not enough to put them out, a disaster agency official said on Thursday, as students on Borneo island staged protests against the government’s handling of the crisis.
Indonesia has been battling its most intense forest fires in 11 years, with the El Niño weather phenomenon driving up temperatures and leaving the country’s vast stretches of forest and peatland more vulnerable to fire.
The persistent fires have caused hundreds of thousands of cases of respiratory illness in Indonesia and badly affected air quality in neighbouring Singapore and Malaysia, with the transboundary haze drawing heavy criticism across the region.
According to data from the EU’s Copernicus climate monitoring service, carbon dioxide emissions from Indonesian fires from October 15 to October 21 reached 14.44 million metric tons, down from 22.22 million tons over the preceding seven days.
The number of “high-confidence” hotspots stood at 565 on Thursday, according to Indonesian forest ministry monitoring platform Sipongi, down from over 1,200 on October 14.
“Based on the latest developments, the number of hotspots has shown a decline; however, the trend remains volatile and is not yet uniform across all regions,” Berton Panjaitan, a spokesperson for Indonesia’s disaster mitigation agency, told Reuters.
Indonesia has deployed more than 69,000 firefighting personnel, up from around 44,000 in mid-September, as well as around 50 aircraft to conduct waterbombing and weather modification operations. Authorities are also testing new methods to put out fires, including special chemicals and the use of dry ice for cloud seeding.
Indonesia’s dry season started earlier than usual this year and has also lasted longer. The rainy season normally starts in October, but the country’s weather agency said it will be delayed until November.
“The potential for new hotspots to emerge persists, especially if rainfall remains uneven and the sources of the fires have not been fully addressed,” Berton said.
At least 100 university students in Banjarmasin in South Kalimantan province staged a protest at the regional house of representatives to demand more concrete action to extinguish the fires, a local news channel showed.
Hundreds of students in Pontianak in West Kalimantan and Samarinda in South Kalimantan also held demonstrations on Wednesday to protest against the local government’s handling of the fires, according to local media.
Berton said authorities would maintain firefighting efforts and strengthen patrols.
“The goal is to prevent new fires and ensure that fires that have been extinguished do not reignite,” he added.
(Reporting by Fransiska Nangoy; Editing by David Stanway)
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