Uttarakhand has witnessed over 1,000 incidents of a forest fire over the last six months, including 45 in the last 24 hours alone.

Forest fires this year

• Since the start of 2021, there has been a series of forest fires in the Himachal Pradesh, Nagaland-Manipur border, Odisha, Madhya Pradesh, and Gujarat, including in wildlife sanctuaries.
• April-May is the season when forest fires take place in various parts of the country.
• But forest fires have been more frequent than usual in Uttarakhand and have also taken place during winter; dry soil caused by a weak monsoon is being seen as one of the causes.

As of 2019, about 21.67% of the country’s geographical area is identified as forest, according to the India State of Forest Report 2019 (ISFR) released by the Forest Survey of India (FSI).  Tree cover makes up another 2.89% (95, 027 sq km).

How vulnerable are forests in Uttarakhand?

• Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh are the two states that witness the most frequent forest fires annually.
• In Uttarakhand, 24,303 sq km (over 45 per cent of the geographical area) is under forest cover.

What causes forest fires?

• Forest fires can be caused by a number of natural causes, but officials say many major fires in India are triggered mainly by human activities.
• Emerging studies link climate change to rising instances of fires globally, especially the massive fires of the Amazon forests in Brazil and in Australia in the last two years.
• Fires of longer duration, increasing intensity, higher frequency and highly inflammable nature are all being linked to climate change.
• In India, forest fires are most commonly reported during March and April, when the ground has large quantities of dry wood, logs, dead leaves, stumps, dry grass and weeds that can make forests easily go up in flames if there is a trigger.
• Under natural circumstances, extreme heat and dryness, friction created by rubbing of branches with each other also have been known to initiate fire.

Why Uttarakhand?

• In Uttarakhand, the lack of soil moisture too is being seen as a key factor. In two consecutive monsoon seasons (2019 and 2020), rainfall has been deficient by 18% and 20% of the seasonal average, respectively.
• But, forest officials say most fires are man-made, sometimes even deliberately caused.
• Even a small spark from a cigarette butt, or a carelessly discarded lit matchstick can set the fire going.
• For example, in Odisha, which saw a major fire last month in Simlipal forest, villagers are known to set dry leaves to fire in order to collect mahua flowers, which go into preparation of a local drink.

Why are forest fires difficult to control?

• The locality of the forest and access to it pose hurdles in initiating firefighting efforts.
• During peak season, shortage of staff is another challenge in dispatching firefighting teams.
• Timely mobilization of forest staff, fuel and equipment, depending on the type of fire, through the thick forests, remain challenges.
• As it is impossible to transport heavy vehicles loaded with water into the thick forests, a majority of fire dousing is initiated manually, using blowers and similar devices.
• But there have been incidents when forest fires were brought under control using helicopter services.
• Wind speed and direction play a critical role in bringing a forest fire under control. The fire often spreads in the direction of the winds and towards higher elevations.

What factors make forest fires a concern?

Forests play an important role in mitigation and adaptation to climate change.

• Carbon emission: They act as a sink, reservoir and source of carbon.
• Livelihood loss: In India, with 1.70 lakh villages in close proximity to forests (Census 2011), the livelihood of several crores of people is dependent on fuelwood, bamboo, fodder, and small timber.
• Destruction of animals’ habitat: Heat generated during the fire destroys animal habitats. Soil quality decreases with the alteration in their compositions.
• Soil degradation: Soil moisture and fertility, too, is affected. Thus forests can shrink in size. The trees that survive fire often remain stunted and growth is severely affected.

Various efforts taken

• Since 2004, the FSI developed the Forest Fire Alert System to monitor forest fires in real-time.
• In its advanced version launched in January 2019, the system now uses satellite information gathered from NASA and ISRO.
• Real-time fire information from identified fire hotspots is gathered using MODIS sensors (1km by 1km grid) and electronically transmitted to FSI.
• This information is then relayed via email at state, district, circle, division, range, beat levels. Users of this system in the locality are issued SMS alerts.

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