SE Asia takes steps to tackle haze
By John Aglionby in Jakarta
Published: November 3 2006 02:00 | Last updated: November 3 2006 02:00
Five south-east Asian countries yesterday signed up to a series of joint measures aimed at preventing a repeat of the choking haze that has blanketed much of the region for months, costing their economies hundreds of millions of dollars.
Indonesia is set to raise spending tenfold on the anti-haze plan, which will include offering seeds to farmers as an incentive to stop clearing their land by burning vegetation.
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Companies in the region will be asked to prepare fire-fighting strategies, while a programme will start to educate communities about the dangers of haze.
Officials from Indonesia, Brunei, Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand said they hoped the steps would cut the number of fires.
The Singaporean government said yesterday that this year's haze had been the worst since 1997.
The smog has forced the closure of airports on several days in Sumatra and Kalimantan, the Indonesian part of Borneo, while some schools have been closed for up to a month.
Masnellyarti Hilman, Indonesia's minister responsible for tackling the haze said the cost to Indonesia, including losses from businesses and tourism, could exceed Rp1,000bn ($100m, �86m).
The smog started to clear this week thanks both to a change in prevailing winds, bringing rain, and the deployment of two Russian BE-200 fire-fighting aircraft.
Ms Masnellyarti said she expected to have an annual budget of Rp500bn to implement the plan, or "about 10 times more than we are spending at present".
Greg Clough, a spokesman for the Centre for International Forestry Research, based in Indonesia, welcomed the plan. "We can't expect poor rural farmers to stop using fire to clear land for farming because it is a very cheap and effective farming tool," he said. "Reimbursing them for their loss of livelihood may encourage them to do that."
东南亚五国联手抗击烟雾
英国《金融时报》约翰? 阿格里昂比(John Aglionby)雅加达报道
2006年11月3日 星期五
东南亚五国昨日签署协议，同意采取一系列联合措施，防止再次出现令人窒息的烟雾。过去数月，该地区大多被烟雾笼罩，给各经济体造成了数亿美元计的损失。
印尼打算把烟雾治理计划支出提高10倍，其中包括向农民提供种子，鼓励他们停止通过烧荒清理土地。
各国政府将要求企业预备好消防战略，同时还将开展一项计划，向社会各界讲解烟雾的危害。
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来自印尼、文莱、新加坡、马来西亚和泰国的官员表示，他们希望这些措施能够减少造成污染的明火燃烧次数。
新加坡政府昨日表示，今年的烟雾是1997年以来最严重的一次。此次烟雾迫使苏门答腊岛和加里曼丹的机场关闭了数日，部分学校关闭长达一个月之久。加里曼丹是婆罗洲属于印尼的那部分领土。
印尼负责处理烟雾问题的部长马斯内尔亚尔蒂?希尔曼(Masnellyarti Hilman)对英国《金融时报》表示，仅是印尼一国的损失（包括商业和旅游业），就可能超过1万亿印尼盾（合1亿美元）。
烟雾本周开始消散，这一方面得益于主风向的改变带来了降雨，另一方面则得益于部署了两架俄罗斯BE-200消防飞机。
马斯内尔亚尔蒂表示，她预计执行这项计划的年预算额将达到5000亿印尼盾，较目前的预算高出大约10倍。
印尼国际林业研究中心(CIFOR)发言人格雷格?克劳夫(Greg Clough)对这项地区计划表示欢迎。“我们不能指望穷困的农民不再通过烧荒来清理农地，因为这是一种非常廉价而有效的农业手段，”他说道。“对他们的生计损失进行补偿也许可以鼓励他们放弃烧荒。”
