The smoke was so bad in Singapore on Friday the Air Quality Index (AQI) peaked at 215 on the National Environment Agency’s Pollutant Standards Index. Levels above 100 are considered to be unhealthy, with levels above 200 considered to be dangerously unhealthy.
Fires in Indonesia are deliberately set to clear forests and peatlands for palm oil and pulp and paper plantations. It is an event that takes place every year without fail. The resulting pollution is so bad that airports and schools have been closed and the number of people with respiratory problems has skyrocketed.
Most of the smoke seems to be coming from the Indonesian province of West Kalimantan, on the island of Borneo, according to ABC.net.au. Indonesia-based conservation scientist Dr. Erik Meijaard says there has been little or no attempt to extinguish the fires.
“West Kalimantan is again on fire quite badly — there are a few hundred fires at least throughout the province,” he says. It appears that most of the fires were started by small landowners and not the big corporations. “Clearly, the seriousness of the political message hasn’t filtered through to the ground and there’s a laissez-faire approach, as there has always been,” Dr. Meijaard.
Indonesia is home to the world’s third largest area of tropical forests and has been criticised by environmental groups worldwide, as well as many governments for failing to stop the slash-and-burn destruction and resulting pollution. The 2015 fires in Indonesia caused a severe pollution problem that lasted over three months, causing respiratory ailments for millions of people.
According to Reuters, Indonesia’s National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB) spokesman Sutopo Nugroho said in a statement on Friday that aerial surveillance showed 67 hot spots in the forest and land fires in the Riau region. He added that 7,200 personnel and several aircraft had been deployed to stop the Riau fires, which seemed to be increasing in number.
The International Business Times reports that according to Indonesian police data, 454 people have been arrested in connection with forest fires so far this year, an increase from the 196 arrests made in 2015. Environment Minister Siti Nurbaya says that patrols have been sent out in an effort to educate people in alternative ways they can clear the land.
