Aug 20, 2009
El Nino will hit hard
Ministers of affected nations to strengthen efforts to fight the fires
By Amresh Gunasingham
The El Nino weather pattern, which brings sustained dry weather, will hit harder than expected, it was revealed on Wednesday at a regional ministerial meeting on the haze. -- ST FILE PHOTO
THE chances of the region being shrouded in a bad haze this year have gone up a notch.
LATEST HOT SPOTS
This is because the El Nino weather pattern, which brings sustained dry weather, will hit harder than expected, it was revealed on Wednesday at a regional ministerial meeting on the haze.
Previous predictions were for a mild to moderate El Nino, but the weatherman has since revised the forecast to 'moderate to strong'.
The continuing practice by farmers in Sumatra, Kalimantan and Sarawak of setting forests and scrub land ablaze to clear land for planting amid the drought will create a smoky pall.
That this is the period of the south-west monsoon will not help. The prevailing winds will blow the haze into South-east Asia, and each time this has happened in the past decade, the region's economies have suffered, as has the health of its people.
Singapore's Minister for the Environment and Water Resources, Dr Yaacob Ibrahim, ruling out the possibility of 'zero haze' this year, said: 'Let's prepare for the worst, do what we can.'
He was at the 8th meeting of the Sub-Regional Ministerial Steering Committee (MSC) on Transboundary Haze Pollution, attended by representatives from Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and the Asean Secretariat.
With El Nino expected to make a stronger stamp in the coming months, the ministers at the meeting agreed to renew efforts to outlaw all open burning in the region and to step up enforcement.
Indonesia, an epicentre of raging forest fires for much of the past decade, unveiled a slew of new initiatives at the meeting. Key among them is its ban on open burning, which took effect this month in Kalimantan, and will be extended to other areas.
Malaysia, on its part, said it had stepped up enforcement on companies in Sarawak, where wildfires consuming more than 1,000ha sent the Air Pollutant Index to unhealthy levels last week.
Read the full story in Thursday's edition of The Straits Times.
[email protected]
El Nino will hit hard
Ministers of affected nations to strengthen efforts to fight the fires
By Amresh Gunasingham
The El Nino weather pattern, which brings sustained dry weather, will hit harder than expected, it was revealed on Wednesday at a regional ministerial meeting on the haze. -- ST FILE PHOTO
THE chances of the region being shrouded in a bad haze this year have gone up a notch.
LATEST HOT SPOTS
This is because the El Nino weather pattern, which brings sustained dry weather, will hit harder than expected, it was revealed on Wednesday at a regional ministerial meeting on the haze.
Previous predictions were for a mild to moderate El Nino, but the weatherman has since revised the forecast to 'moderate to strong'.
The continuing practice by farmers in Sumatra, Kalimantan and Sarawak of setting forests and scrub land ablaze to clear land for planting amid the drought will create a smoky pall.
That this is the period of the south-west monsoon will not help. The prevailing winds will blow the haze into South-east Asia, and each time this has happened in the past decade, the region's economies have suffered, as has the health of its people.
Singapore's Minister for the Environment and Water Resources, Dr Yaacob Ibrahim, ruling out the possibility of 'zero haze' this year, said: 'Let's prepare for the worst, do what we can.'
He was at the 8th meeting of the Sub-Regional Ministerial Steering Committee (MSC) on Transboundary Haze Pollution, attended by representatives from Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand and the Asean Secretariat.
With El Nino expected to make a stronger stamp in the coming months, the ministers at the meeting agreed to renew efforts to outlaw all open burning in the region and to step up enforcement.
Indonesia, an epicentre of raging forest fires for much of the past decade, unveiled a slew of new initiatives at the meeting. Key among them is its ban on open burning, which took effect this month in Kalimantan, and will be extended to other areas.
Malaysia, on its part, said it had stepped up enforcement on companies in Sarawak, where wildfires consuming more than 1,000ha sent the Air Pollutant Index to unhealthy levels last week.
Read the full story in Thursday's edition of The Straits Times.
[email protected]
