August 6, 2026 | 04:34 pm
Forest and land fires are expanding and showing no signs of subsiding. The risk of economic, social, and political turmoil is increasing.
WE, the people of Indonesia, should be prepared to face the impact of the forest and land fires (wildfires) currently spreading around different regions. Not only do they cause damage to the environment and adversely affect public health, the annual disasters also heighten the risk of an economic shock. Amid the poor governance of the present administration, the domino effect of the calamities this time can result in multiple entanglements.
The risk is now growing. Data provided by SiPongi, a forest and land fire monitoring system of the Forestry Ministry, indicate that the extent of fires during the period of January-June 2026 already reached 107,500 hectares. The figures doubled the records in the same period of 2019 and 2023, the years when wildfires affected over 1 million hectares.
Many experts have in fact issued an early warning about the rising potential for a surge of forest and land fire exposure this year. The sea surface temperature in the eastern equator of the Pacific Ocean has kept warming since the beginning of 2026. Several studies have estimated that the climatic phenomenon commonly called El Niño can reach a level of high intensity—with a rise in sea surface temperature of more than 2 degrees Celsius above normal. Consequently, extreme drought almost certainly will prevail in most regions in Indonesia. During such periods, human activities are prone to trigger fires, especially on peatland.
The high indication figures of the extent of fires in the first semester deserve attention. The fires affected broader areas in 35 provinces when super El Niño had not actually arrived yet. The result of modeling by the team of the Climate and Atmospheric Research Center of the National Research and Innovation Agency (BRIN) has predicted that El Niño will get to its peak at a high-intensity level in October-December 2026 so that its aftermath is likely to linger next year.
At present, it certainly cannot yet be imagined how vast land and forests will be razed by fires within the next six months. In 2023, El Niño at a high-intensity level caused the figures of wildfire cases to soar to 1.16 million hectares. When the latest super El Niño occurred in 2015, the areas burned totaled 2.61 million hectares.
The certain thing is that the high potential for forest and land fire catastrophes this year coincides with the worsening governance of the administration under President Prabowo Subianto. The budget for disaster control—including regional finances—is slashed to fund the President’s ambitious projects, such as free nutritious meals and red-and-white village cooperatives. The peat rehabilitation program, which is very important to prevent wildfires, has increasingly lacked proper direction since Prabowo dissolved the Peat and Mangrove Restoration Agency.
This condition is deeply worrying. Some studies have shown that large-scale and protracted wildfires taking place previously always eroded the income of communities in impacted regions. At the same time, disrupted production and distribution of vital commodities like food and energy spurred price hikes.
The domino effect has been noticed in West Kalimantan, the province with the broadest area gutted by fire today. Strategic food prices have kept rising over the last three months. Fuel supply in this province is also reportedly limited due to smoke disturbance. The same problems are now haunting other provinces frequented by wildfires in Kalimantan, Sumatra, Nusa Tenggara, and Papua.
Sadly, as we are aware, the domestic economy is now quite shaky. It is not impossible that the series of uncontrolled wildfire impacts will spark off social and political upheavals. The strings of events occurring after the conflagration in 1997 should serve as a lesson.
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