RIAU IN STATE OF EMERGENCY AS HAZE DISRUPTS HUMANS, ANIMALS by Fardah

    Jakarta, Feb. 27, 2014 (Antara) - Haze from forest fires in the Riau province has forced people to flee to safer areas and caused Sumatran tigers to leave their habitat, 43,386 people to suffer from respiratory problems, and caused flight cancellations.

        Taking into consideration the huge impact it has caused, the Riau provincial administration has declared a state of emergency effective Feb. 25, 2014. It has categorized the forest, plantation, and peatland fires as an extraordinary event.

         Earlier, of the province's 12 districts/cities, seven districts including Bengkalis, Rokan Hilir, Indragiri Hulu, Indragiri Hilir, Siak, Pelalawan, and Meranti and Dumai city had elevated the fire alert level to a status of emergency. 
    "Riau is experiencing an extraordinary event, and therefore, we have declared a status of emergency response, as seven districts and a city had previously announced a similar status. Tomorrow, we will send a letter to the central government seeking help," Riau Governor Annas Maamun stated in Pekanbaru, on February 25.

         On the morning of February 27, the Terra and Aqua satellites detected 134 hotspots in Riau, most of which were located in the districts of Bengkalis, Rokan Hilir, and Pelalawan. The number was much lower than the 1,234 hotspots detected on February 24.

          The visibility significantly dropped to only 10-20 meters in the morning due to the haze. In Dumai, the visibility drastically decreased to only five meters during the early hours of February 11.  
    The haze had disrupted international and domestic air traffic in the Riau province due to the decreased visibility.

         Riau has suffered losses worth Rp10 trillion due to the haze. Viator Butar Butar, the deputy chairman of the Riau Chamber of Commerce and Industry's Economic and International Cooperation Section explained that the Rp10 trillion losses were assessed, among other things, from the slowdown of business productivity and goods, mobility of the people and the cancellation or postponement of flights and shipping.

        Since February 19, forest fires have been raging uncontrollably in Riau due to the lack of water as the springs have dried up and the weather is dry.

         Sugarin, the head of the Pekanbaru Meteorological, Climatology, and Geophysics Agency, noted that no rains were forecast in Riau until next week. The dry conditions may aggravate the fires, he pointed out.

         He reported that the wind is blowing from the northeast to the southwest, thereby dispersing smoke from the Riau fires over the West Sumatra province, which is resulting in haze.

         Fires engulfed 3,629 hectares of forested area in Bengkalis and 1.5 thousand hectares in Siak. It is suspected that a few local people had deliberately started the fire to clear land for new plantations. At least 13 people have been questioned for allegedly setting off the fires.

        On February 27, the Riau health office's Head, Zainal Arifin, reported that 43,386 people suffered from respiratory problems due to the haze. The number was almost double than the 22 thousand patients reported on February 24.

         He urged the local residents to use face masks to protect themselves from contracting respiratory illnesses. The local health service office has distributed thousands of face masks to pedestrians and motor cyclists.

         "We urge the people to stay indoors and use face masks if they have to venture outdoors to prevent contracting respiratory problems," he advised.

         Dumai city's air pollution level rose to "very hazardous" with the Pollution Standards Index (PSI) rising to 500 during the early hours of February 22. The PSI surged upward from 63 PSI recorded on the previous day.

         The people exposed to the haze from forest fires are prone to suffering from respiratory problems, pneumonia, and eye and skin irritations.

         Besides affecting people, the haze has also disturbed the wildlife in Riau's forests. Four Sumatran tigers (Panthera Tigris Sumatrae) were reportedly wandering in the area where fire brigade personnel were extinguishing a fire that had engulfed a forest, which is a tiger habitat, in the Bukit Batu subdistrict in Bengkalis.

          A female tiger and her cub were spotted in the Bukit Lengkung village in Bukit Batu, while two adult tigers were seen in the Temiang village, also in Bukit Batu, M. Jalal, the head of the Bengkalis disaster mitigation office (BPBD) noted on February 27.

            "We know that the tigers must be scared due to the thick haze covering their habitat. We just avoided them and reported about the tigers to the Riau natural resource conservation office," he stated.

             The forest area, which is located at the border of the Bengkalis district and Dumai city, is the habitat of Sumatran tigers.

          Traces of the felines were also found near a refugee camp in Barak Aceh, where 125 inhabitants of Tanjung Leban are seeking refuge due to the thick haze. In the Medang Kampai subdistrict, 109 people were evacuated to safer places as their villages have been blanketed by haze.

         According to information posted on the World Wild Life Fund website, the Sumatran tiger, numbering fewer than 400 in the wild, is found exclusively on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, the last stronghold of the tigers in Indonesia.

         Following the declaration of emergency, Commander of the Military Regional Command Brigadier General Prihadi Agus Irianto has set a target of 14 days, within which a special operation to extinguish the forest fires in Riau will be completed.     
"We have set a target for the haze emergency response, within 14 days the fires will be extinguished," Irianto informed Antara, at the Haze Emergency Response Command Post, Roesmin Nurjadin Airbase in Pekanbaru, on February 27.

          The army has deployed two battalions of personnel to help extinguish the fires. Currently, 150 army officers have been deployed to fight the fires.

         They are being assisted by the police personnel, volunteers of the Riau Disaster Mitigation Agency (BPBD), the forestry ministry's forest fire brigade, and the local administration's personnel.

           Additional personnel will be deployed in the Bengkalis district, where the largest number of forest fire hotspots has been detected. Several Bengkalis residents have also been evacuated to safer places as their villages are covered by thick haze.

           Commander of the Roesmin Nurjadin Airbase Colonel Andyawan remarked that the Air Force is ready to deploy 325 personnel to help fight the fires.

           Meanwhile, hotspots in forests, plantations, and peatland fires, which were reported in the Sumatra and Kalimantan islands early this year, have forced the Indonesian government to intensify its efforts to deal with the problem.

         "Usually haze occurs in May or June. But, this year, the haze has occurred in January and February in Riau and West Kalimantan," National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB) spokesman Sutopo recently noted in Jakarta.

        On February 11, the BNPB held a coordination meeting with several government and law enforcement agencies to tackle the problem of haze from forest fires and droughts this year.

         The government will address the forest fire issue through land and aerial operations. The land operation will involve, among others, military officers, police, forest fire brigade units, and civilian security personnel.

         The aerial operations will include air-borne water bombing and weather modification or cloud seeding technologies.

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F001/A/BESSR/A/A. Abdussalam) 27-02-2014 23:43:35