T

he Fiji National Fire Authority will send its personnel to Jakarta to learn from Jakarta'€™s firefighters as the former has signed a cooperation agreement with the city administration.

Fiji National Fire Authority chairman Francis Kean and Deputy Governor Basuki '€œAhok'€ Tjahaja Purnama signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) at City Hall on Monday, marking the beginning of cooperation between both authorities.

'€œWe see a lot of similarities in Jakarta with our fire department back home in Fiji. We expanded our roles from purely firefighting toward saving lives, so our operation is now similar to that of the fire agency in Indonesia,'€ Kean told reporters after the signing.

Kean, however, did not elaborate on the details regarding the number of personnel participating in the program.

'€œThis will depend on the goodwill of our counterparts here in Indonesia. But within a couple of months we will see our firefighters coming to your lovely city,'€ he said.

Jakarta Fire Agency head Subejo said the Fiji firefighters would join local firefighters and study how they handled fire incidents for a couple of months.

'€œThey can see how we handle different situations as we face a lot of challenges here. For instance, most fire incidents in Jakarta occur in slum areas that are difficult to be accessed by fire trucks,'€ he said.

Ahok said Jakarta might also send its personnel to train Fiji firefighters in their country.

'€œWe can also send instructors there,'€ he said.

Kean said the program was part of the Fiji government'€™s effort to reduce fire incidents in its home
country.

'€œAt the moment, we have [recorded] about 70 fire incidents in January,'€ Kean said, adding that the Fiji government had set a target of zero fire incidents.

According to Subejo, the Jakarta Fire Agency had recorded 260 fires throughout this year, far below that of previous years.

'€œIn 2012, we recorded more than 1,000 fires,'€ he said, pointing out that emergency training programs for local residents had contributed to the reduction.

Subejo said public participation was among the key factors that could minimize the risks when fires occurred.

'€œWhen a fire breaks out, residents should be aware about what they have to do while waiting for firefighters to arrive. Anything can be used: A wet towel or a wet sack for example. The standard response time is 15 minutes but we aim to reduce that to below 10 minutes by building more mobile posts,'€ Subejo said, adding that Jakarta was home to more than 100 mobile posts throughout the city.