Jakarta (ANTARA) - The National Disaster Mitigation Agency (BNPB) prioritizes land operations to deal with forest and land fires (karhutla) that are also the impact of El Niño phenomenon in Indonesia.
In an online discussion followed in Jakarta on Monday, Head of BNPB, Lt Gen. Suharyanto, stated that Indonesia had an unfavorable record regarding the handling of forest and land fires in 2015 and 2019, so it should not be repeated.
Mitigation is also prioritized for farmers in the six provinces of South Sumatra, Riau, Jambi, West Kalimantan, South Kalimantan, and Central Kalimantan according to Presidential Instruction No. 3 of 2020.
"In dealing with the karhutla, what is important is ground operations. Hence, the ground troops have returned to alert, bearing in mind that the last three years have seen relatively large forest fires, and the land area is relatively small. Also, many of the pieces of equipment, which may have been three years old and were not used much, are now being reactivated," Suharyanto revealed.
Suharyanto noted that if the fires were to get bigger and could not be overcome by land operations, then the BNPB is preparing the last step of deploying water-bombing helicopter.
In this case, the BNPB has provided 31 water-bombing helicopters in six provinces focused on handling forest and land fires in areas not reachable by land operations.
He emphasized that the operation of a water-bombing helicopter was the last option if the ground suppression operation was not possible, as the air suppression operation required a lot of money.
"To monitor the occurrence of forest and land fires, we also integrate all applications owned by ministries and agencies, from the military, police, regional governments, the Indonesian Ministry of Environment and Forestry, BNPB, and BMKG (Meteorological, Climatological, and Geophysical Agency)," Suharyanto stated.
Suharyanto emphasized that the task of extinguishing forest and land fires is not only the main function of BNPB but is also a joint task if fires and drought occurred outside the six priority provinces.
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