Background

• What is Fire Danger Rating?
• Project Initiation
• Project Purpose
• Project Benefits
• Project Design and Activities

What is Fire Danger Rating?

Fire danger rating is the process of systematically evaluating the individual and combined factors influencing fire danger. A Fire Danger Rating System (FDRS) is a forecasting tool that measures the risk of wildfires starting and spreading. Forecasts are based on daily meteorological observations, which are modified by analysis of vegetation as potential fuel. In countries like Canada, with extensive annual fire occurrence from natural, prescribed, and accidental fires, information systems have been developed to help managers reduce fire damage. These systems support the regulation of activities with a high risk of causing fire and the effective deployment of fire-suppression resources. Fire information systems provide the fundamental information on which this planning for avoidance, reduction, and suppression of fires is based.

Partly because of its large fire problem, Canada has been, since the 1960s, a leader in developing and operating FDRS as a cornerstone of integrated fire management programs. In 1995, the Canadian Forest Service became involved in Southeast Asia fire management by developing a prototype FDRS for the region, which continues daily operation via the Internet.

Project Initiation

For the past several decades, fires and associated haze have increasingly affected the economies, population health, and environment in four countries in Southeast Asia—Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore. During the fire and haze disaster of 1997–1998, damage estimates exceeding US $9 billion were reported, which excluded many direct and indirect costs.

At that time, large numbers of fire-suppression personnel were mobilized, but their effectiveness was limited by a lack of reliable, current information on the locations of the fires and the environmental conditions promoting their ignition and spread, as well as a lack of trained fire-suppression personnel, equipment, and management infrastructure.

In response to the crisis situation and in an attempt to prevent losses of such magnitude from occurring again, the environment ministers in the region, through the Haze Technical Task Force, approved in December 1997 the Regional Haze Action Plan (RHAP). The RHAP commits the countries to a regional approach to reducing the probability of fires and, when fires do occur, to combining fire-suppression resources to fight them. One of the monitoring mechanisms proposed for implementation as part of the RHAP was a regional FDRS.

In February 1999, the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) asked Natural Resources Canada's Canadian Forest Service (CFS) at the Northern Forestry Centre to implement the Southeast Asia FDRS Project. The purpose of the FDRS project was to enhance the capacity of resource management organizations in Southeast Asia to manage land and forest fires and associated haze. The FDRS project supported CIDA's goals of strengthening environmental management capacity in the countries of Southeast Asia and enhancing regional cooperation in transboundary issues. The FDRS project was"regional" in context, which means that it addressed the FDRS requirements that are common across those Southeast Asian countries that experience a significant impact from land and forest fires and associated haze. The Southeast Asia FDRS Project ended in 2003.

Project Purpose

The project was aimed at enhancing regional cooperation in environmental issues, including transboundary issues, through four interrelated programs.

Adaptation

Technical assistance to recalibrate and adjust the Canadian FDRS for local tropical conditions, commencing regionally and in Indonesia (centrally and two provinces), to support decision-making and action in the areas of fire prediction, prevention, and mitigation.

 

Operation

Technology transfer and training activities to increase competence within national and local cooperating resource management agencies to sustainably maintain and operate an FDRS.

 

Application

Education and demonstration projects to increase capacity within national and local cooperating resource management agencies to understand outputs of the FDRS and to develop actions based on those outputs.

 

Regional Systems

Focused collaboration to strengthen technical development, coordination, management, and integration of fire systems in the region.

 

The FDRS developed for the region was designed to support the most important and relevant types of decisions faced by fire control managers. These decisions relate to land-use activity and regulation, planning and allocation of fire-suppression resources, daily incident response, and planning and permits for broadcast burning.

Project Benefits

The Southeast Asia FDRS Project benefits were as follows:

• Expanded application of the FDRS in fire-prone areas of Southeast Asia
• Enhancement of land and forest fire information and management systems in the region, to complement the FDRS.
• Enhanced awareness and capacity of regional networks to provide early warning of land and forest fires and to provide improved mechanisms to manage transboundary haze.

Project Accomplishments

A cornerstone of the Southeast Asia FDRS Project was the creation of working partnerships, which will ensure the long-term sustainability of the FDRS. As a result, CIDA funds were dispersed in conjunction with partner contributions. The first partnership has been developed jointly with Indonesia (the Indonesia Initiative). Other partnerships (Innovation Initiatives) are currently being developed, with the expected results outlined above as a guide.

The Indonesia Initiative will commence with a central system, focusing on the fire-prone areas of Kalimantan and Sumatra. The FDRS will support Indonesian central agencies in monitoring fire conditions and in developing national-level actions to support prevention, monitoring, and mitigation activities at the provincial level. The central-level FDRS will also be adapted and operated electronically and manually in two provinces in Indonesia. One province will be selected from Sumatra (Riau or South Sumatra) and one from Kalimantan (West or Central Kalimantan). A sequential approach will be used, beginning with the province in Sumatra. During the first provincial initiative, the CFS will lead the adaptation, operator training, and output-based activities. During the second provincial initiative, these activities will be directed by Indonesian agencies with support from CFS.

As part of the Innovation Initiative it is anticipated that early in the project the currently operating Southeast Asia FDRS prototype will be recalibrated and turned over to an operating agency within the region to continue providing regional FDRS outputs. In addition, there is significant interest from other jurisdictions within the region for an operational FDRS, notably Sabah and Brunei. Subject to the development of formal arrangements, work on an FDRS with one of these jurisdictions may proceed earlier in the project.