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Place of publication :
Publication year : 2002
Thematic : Forestry
Language :
Note
In 1997, a huge blanket of smoke covered much of Southeast Asia. This disaster grabbed world headlines, not only because of its sheer scale—an estimated 70 million people in six countries were affected—but also because of the apocalyptic images that accompanied it: near darkness at noon, road traffic slowed to a crawl, grounded aircraft, tanker collisions at sea, emergency services stretched to breaking point and hospital wards filled with casualties. Yet this was by no means the first occurrence of smoke pollution in the region. Similar episodes have occurred many times before—most recently in 1994. Nor is the problem confined to Southeast Asia: smoke has long been a local, and sometimes an international, issue in the Amazon, and most savannas in Africa’s humid tropics would be forest if not for frequent fires. A lot of forest in Asia and Latin America will become savanna or grasslands if present patterns of fire continue.
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Keywords : Subtropical Convergence
Encoded by : Pauline Carmel Joy Eje
