How to Use Fire to Protect Forests from Wildfires

Table of Contents

1. Indigenous Australians' deliberate forest fires

2. Learn from the wisdom of the natives

3. Korea's afforestation project controversy after forest fire in Gangwon-do Province

 

 

 

1. Indigenous Australians' deliberate forest fires

 

Saving Forests with Fire, one of the 2022 World Press Photo winners. There are indigenous people in Australia who deliberately set fire to forests. Nawarddeken natives of northern Australia. Long before white people entered Australia, native people had set fire to forests. It is said that he spent quite a lot of time traveling through the forest before setting the fire. It identifies the topography, the degree of thickening of shrubs, the condition of vegetation under the tree, and the distribution of biodiversity in the forest. Then, position it delicately and set it partially on fire. Mosaic, mainly on flaming dry vegetation. The reason why they set fire like this is to prevent bigger forest fires. It's to stop the fire with fire. In modern terms, it is 'fire line' or 'preventive forest fire'.
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The white Australian conquerors considered these wildfires by the natives to be bizarre and uncivilized. However, Nawarddeken natives continued to set fire to the area as the dry season approached. Curiously, large forest fires in other areas were less affected. Increasingly, people have come to realize that this traditional wisdom provides excellent guidance for forest fire disasters caused by the climate crisis.
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All the forests on Earth have evolved with fire. Natural ignition and forest fires are a kind of forest ecosystem reset. It removes all kinds of miscellaneous biomass that functions as forest fire fuel and provides important functions for forming forests healthier and more diversely. However, as the climate crisis intensified, drought and dry weather began to increase the scale of forest fires and significantly damage natural resilience.

 

2. Learn from the wisdom of the natives

 

Currently, Australia continues to implement mosaic-type partial arson by incorporating modern technologies such as digital mapping into the traditional wisdom of the Nawardeken natives. Government subsidies and carbon credits create jobs each year, employing more than 150 Indigenous Rangers. the guards of the forest This is to make the forest ecosystem younger and prevent bigger forest fires. Years of research have shown that by cultivating and protecting forests, they are successfully reducing carbon through fire prevention. Revenue from the prevention system is said to be returning to local Aboriginal communities and ecological protection projects.
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Recently, global forest fire agencies are insisting on learning from the wisdom of the natives in line with the catastrophic forest fire era. World Press Photo chose the photo as one of the award-winning films and commented on what it would have been like to borrow this wisdom from the natives before the recent catastrophic Australian bushfires. The idea is to learn the wisdom of how native Amazonians have protected rainforests through partial logging and how native people around the world have protected forests.
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For example, the Mediterranean is the area where European ecologists and global forest fire agencies are most concerned. Concerns are growing shortly after last year's massive wildfires in the Mediterranean, including Turkey, Greece and southern Italy. It is pointed out that the Mediterranean forest, which is densely packed with highly flammable pine trees, is the best condition for forest fires to occur.
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He also mentions the wisdom of farmers and natives in the Mediterranean region. A long time ago, Mediterranean farmers rake up miscellaneous biomass of fallen leaves and dry vegetation under shrubs It has been used as fertilizer for crops. You can also get natural fertilizers and prevent forest fires. On the other hand, the way animals such as goats and sheep have been grazed in the forest was also an excellent precaution. This is because animals roam the forest and eat up miscellaneous vegetation that functions as wildfire fuel.
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However, as rural areas shrink and farmers leave for cities, Mediterranean forests become increasingly neglected. The highly flammable pine trees are dense, and as farmers disappear, conditions have been created for thick vegetation and a bigger fire in one fire.
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Several studies published in the European journal Plant Sociology. Several measures are being proposed to prevent the Mediterranean bushfire disaster. 1. Plant broad-leaved trees that contain moisture like oak trees, not pine trees after a forest fire. 2. Promote tree species diversity through natural afforestation 3. Do not plant seedlings artificially, but sprinkle acorns as much as possible. 4. Support farmers to prevent forest fires and restore rural areas.

 

3. Korea's afforestation project controversy after forest fire in Gangwon-do Province

Recently, after passing through the worst forest fire in Gangwon-do, Korea is also debating over post-forestry afforestation. It's a very simple story. The Korean Peninsula is warming more than twice as fast as the global average. In other words, the forest soil continues to dry up. In addition, drinking a lot of water and continuing to artificially plant highly flammable pine trees is tantamount to a continuous fire. The reason is the Korea Forest Service's poor economic concept of quantifying and quantifying forests like national projects, forest creation, and wood production sites, not considering them as ecological homes.
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Currently, in the event of a forest fire, the Korea Forest Service removes all trees damaged by the fire and processes them into wood pellets and carries them to the power plant. Renewable energy weights allow power plants to hit wood pellets excitedly with state subsidies. In addition, the more artificial afforestation continues, the more advantageous the Korea Forest Service is to secure a budget. This is why they damage the soil and plant trees such as pine trees and fir trees when forest fires occur without any philosophy about the ecosystem.
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In foreign countries, there is at least a standard of 'fire severity burn severity'. The degree of damage caused by forest fires is carefully classified and the direction of reforestation is determined. If everything is seriously burned out and the remains of forest fires cover the soil, and the topsoil layer breaks down like wax and water cannot penetrate at all, it is right to do artificial cooking. Even in such a case, the standard for variety of plant species should be set. In other words, plant broadleaf trees with a lot of water. If the level of forest fires is not so severe, it is better to prioritize natural afforestation. This is because it makes it easier to secure species diversity and protect soil.
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What we need is an attitude of learning. Why would global fire agencies recently say that they should lend strength to keywords such as "creating mosaic forests," "preventive fires," "vegetation diversity," and "drought-resistant trees" and borrow the wisdom of natives. It is most important to reduce carbon as soon as possible, but it is also important to rewrite the prevention manual for forest fires that are bound to increase.a budget-grabbing hippopotamus group; an uncontrolled bureaucratic group; the Korea Forest Service. It's really problematic.

 

 

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