The Jakarta Post 27 Feb 16;
JAKARTA: NASA satellites detected 47 hot spots across Sumatra on Friday despite a downpour over the past two days, Pekanbaru office of the Meteorology, Climatology and Geophysics Agency (BMKG) announced.
The number increased from 45 hot spots detected on Thursday afternoon, said local BMKG official Slamet Riyadi.
Of the 47 hotspots, 16 were found in Aceh, 15 in Riau, 12 in North Sumatra and two each in Bengkulu and Lampung.
In Riau, nine hotspots were detected in Bengkalis district, two in Siak and two each in Pelalawan and Meranti Islands.
Last year, parts of the country suffered what many deemed the worst forest fires in the last 10 years. Forest fires have been an annual problem in Indonesia since the mid-1990s, but last year’s were the worst since 1997 when blazes spread across nearly 10 million hectares.
Last year’s fires caused an ecological disaster, health problems and economic losses — 2.1 million hectares of land was burned, 21 lives lost and more than half a million people suffered respiratory problems.
The World Bank has estimated that Indonesia’s economy lost US$16 billion due to the fires, more than double what was spent on rebuilding Aceh after the 2004 tsunami.
