Private companies may be responsible for forest fires in Riau: Government

Adianto P. Simamora, The Jakarta Post 3 Aug 09;

The government has said that private companies might responsible for ongoing forest fires in Riau, which has forced the temporary closure of the regional airport on Monday because of thick haze caused visibility to drop.

The State Ministry for the Environment deployed a team to investigate the repeated forest fires to determine where and how the fires started.

“Seeing such huge forest fires, I am suspicious it is the work of companies operating in the province. Our team is still working in the field to investigate it,” Illyas Asaad, deputy environment minister for law enforcement, told The Jakarta Post on Monday.

Data from WWF Indonesia shows the number of hotspots in Riau province increased from 973 in January to 2,395 in July, the highest number in the nation.

A hotspot is defined as a fire covering at least a hectare.

The WWF said that the number dropped to 83 in April, before again increasing to 953 in May.

On August 1, the WWF detected a total of 97 hotspots in Riau. It said that about 52 percent of the hotspots were located on land belonging to the local people, 31 percent were in production forests while the remaining 17 percent were on private plantations.

Illyas said his office would announce the results of its investigation this week.