By Henrylito D. Tacio
A couple of years ago, the Philippine Congress released a study that said about 123,000 hectares of the country’s forest cover are lost every year. Unless reforestation is started, the study further stated, there would be no forest left in the country by 2036 – that’s exactly 21 years from now.
President Benigno S. Aquino III, in his state of the nation address (SONA) in 2011, stated that most politicians use one possible solution – that of tree planting – as a photo opportunity. “They plant trees, but they do not ensure that the trees would remain standing after they leave,” he said.
When he was still the head of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR), Michael Defensor admitted that “only 30 percent of reforestation projects succeeded.” In a Subic meeting of local executives, he told them: “People hardly recognize the economic benefits from protecting the environment. Most sabotaged the program.”
The bluntness seemed to echo an earlier study of the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, entitled “Sustainable Forest Management,” which stated, “Most of the (Philippines’) once rich forest are gone. Forest recovery, through natural and artificial means, never coped with the destruction rate.”
When Ferdinand Magellan “rediscovered” the Philippines in 1521, forests blanketed 95 percent of the country. When the Ormoc City, Leyte tragedy happened – which left 8,000 people dead – timber cover was only 18 percent.
“Where have all our forests gone?” asked Roy C. Alimoane, the director of Davao-based Mindanao Baptist Rural Life Center. American President Theodore Roosevelt once said, “A people without children would face a hopeless future; a country without trees is almost as helpless.”
When people talk of deforestation, they always think of loggers, both legal and illegal. “Who had the privilege of cutting trees?” asked veteran journalist Marites Dañguilan-Vitug in an article she wrote for “World Paper,” a Boston-based magazine. “The wealthy and well-connected. They lived in the big cities. Some even sold their rights to the forest concessions and lived off the green of the land.”
In the past, forest resources helped fuel the country’s economy. In the 1970s, Philippines was touted the prima donna among world timber exporters. Today, it is considered “a wood-pauper,” to quote the words of multi-awarded journalist Juan Mercado.
Loggers are not the only ones to be blamed for the disappearance of the country’s forest cover. Even farmers, particularly kaingineros who practice slash-and-burn agriculture. They cut trees to give way to the crops (corn, upland rice, and vegetables) to be planted.
The Forest Management Bureau reported that forest cover in the country declined from 21 million hectares, or 70 percent of the its land area, in 1900 to about 6.5 million hectares by 2007, mostly due to intensive logging and subsequent conversion to agriculture.
But what most people don’t know that forest fires also contribute to the denudation of the country’s forest cover. In 1991, for instance, at least 21,908 hectares of forests were razed by fire, 13,129 hectares of grasslands, 2,205 hectares of secondary-growth forest and 6,547 hectares of reforestation projects.
In a paper presented in a regional conference in Chiang Mai, Thailand, E.V. Soliman said that from 1978 to 1996, forest fires in the Philippines destroyed approximately 304,345 hectares. That an average of 16,000 hectares per year. From 1992 to 1996 alone, fire damage was estimated at P465 million.
More than monetary values, forest fires also destroy other things. “Forest fires damage the soil and biodiversity in affected areas,” said the Laguna-based Philippine Council for Agriculture, Aquatic and Natural Resources Research and Development (PCAARRD). “These also derail the country’s reforestation efforts.”
PCAARRD, a line agency of the Department of Science and Technology, decided to develop science- and technology-based tools to help forest managers and other stakeholders in predicting the probability of fire occurrence. “The fire behaviour model simulates and predicts fire movements,” said the newly-released PCAARRD Information Bulletin No. 25.
This is a good news as summer – touted to be the fire season – is here. The tools which PCAARRD is promoting are integrated with geographic information system (GIS), remote sensing, global positioning system (GPS), and Web innovations.
“These interactive disaster and hazard management models were programed for easy information dissemination and will allow a location-specific application,” explained PCAARRD.
“Using this web-enabled hazard decision support system, various maps – which can be resized on-screen and point-clicked with their corresponding attributes and statistics – can be accessed and generated,” it added.
Negative impacts and destruction brought by uncontrolled forest fires are unlimited. As such, preventing forest fires is better than any fire control measure. “Fire prediction is an important prevention measure,” said PCAARRD, adding that its researchers were able to develop a forest fire hazard and behavior forecasting and a risk reduction system using GIS.
“Through the project, fire hazard maps were developed for Itogon, Benguet, and Carranglan, Nueva Ecija. The maps used the prediction equation, which combines a number of critical factors that significantly influence forest fires. These are: vegetation or land cover; proximity to farms; distance to roads; slope; and aspect,” the information bulletin said.
Vegetation refers to the vegetative cover or current land use pattern which determines the kind, quantity, and quality of fuels present on site. Fuels present, as an element of the fire triangle, determine fire risks. “An element of fire triangle is a model that shows the relationship between the essential elements of fire,” the information bulletin explained.
Proximity to farms and road is a factor in the prediction equation due to previous fire incidents in farms and careless passers-by and pranksters throwing lighting materials like lighted cigarettes.
The area’s slope, meanwhile, enhances burning since “the steeper slope promotes rapid spread of fire upslope.”
The aspect refers to the horizontal direction where the mountain slope faces. “The aspect is also considered because drying of fuels is more prevalent along east-west slopes than north-south facing slopes,” the PCAARRD publication informed.
According to PCAARDD, highly-vulnerable, vulnerable, and less-vulnerable sites are identified on the calibrated maps. “Through these fire hazard maps, forest managers and other stakeholders will be properly guided on fire risks, especially during fire season,” it said.
Forest managers include the forest protection unit of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources and local government units. Stakeholders refer to people living in and near the forests and farmers who are directly involved in reforestation projects.
The PCAARDD publication suggests that practices causing fire ignition (like slash and re-growth of grass for grazing purposes) should not be allowed during the fire season in places adjacent to high risk areas. Proper local ordinances and their strict implementation can help lessen the chances of fire.
“If coupled with appropriate information, education and communication strategies and replicated in other areas, these hazard maps will hopefully make every barangay (village) ready and responsive to forest fires,” the PCARRD publication concluded.
However, fire behavior can be evaluated by using the BehavePlus (version 5). It is a free and downloadable fire behavior software that can be used to assess fire behaviour and risks in specific sites.
BehavePlus provides a more site-specific fire behavior assessment (like rate of fire spread, fire intensity, and direction of spread, to name a few) than the fire hazard maps that only give broad predictions. “Moreover, users can even input environmental parameters like fuel characteristics,” PCAARRD said.
0 Comments
Oldest