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View all search resultsA preventable disaster
Increased vigilance and prevention are the best defense in battling forest and land fires.
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Thick smoke rises from a forest and land fire in Tumbang Nusa village, Pulang Pisau regency, Central Kalimantan, on Aug. 4, 2026. (Antara/Auliya Rahman)
F
irefighters are battling flames in parts of Kalimantan, Java and Sulawesi. Water bombing aircraft are dropping water to control hot spots. And some regions are issuing fire warnings for the next few months.
These are events and actions we see almost every year during dry seasons.
But the start of this year’s fire season is already alarming with a surge in fire activities reported ahead of peak of a strong El Niño.
Data from the Forest Ministry and independent analysis show that burned areas and fire hot spots have surpassed levels recorded during the same period in the previous strong El Niño in 2019, when the country suffered one of its most destructive fire seasons in recent history.
Some 107,000 hectares of land and forest, an area nearly twice the size of Jakarta, burned nationwide in the first half of the year, about 120 percent higher than during the same period in 2019. Around 116,000 fire hot spots have been detected across the country since January, about 6,000 more than during the same period in 2019.
Meanwhile, satellite images detected haze in South Sumatra, West Kalimantan, Central Kalimantan and South Kalimantan.
More than 70 percent of Indonesia’s seasonal zones have now entered a strong El Niño phase, but the peak of burning months is still expected to last until October.
