Integration of Fire Risk in a Sustainable Forest Management Model

Abstract

Abstract:In Mediterranean areas, forest fires are a considerable risk most years. The seasonality of the climate with a dry summer, high temperatures and low rainfall (which implies increased flammability of materials) is one of the main factors in the ignition and progression of fires. This factor conjugated with more favourable biophysical conditions (e.g., high slopes, aspect) leads to easy propagation and the increasingly destructive power of such phenomena. To prevent and reduce the consequences of forest fires, it is necessary to simulate and forecast the territory use and management, not only focused on forest areas, but also on all land uses and agricultural activities that may coexist there, considering the probability of fire occurrence. The objective of this paper is to present a methodological approach to address the integration of fire risk in integrated Mediterranean forest management models. The methodological approach considers simultaneously the climatic conditions through different times of the year (more or less favourable to forest fire damage) and structural conditions addressed to land uses, aspect, slope, roads and demographic density. The methodological approach was implemented in a management area located in the Algarve, in southern Portugal. The results for the Algarve region showed that the proposed approach is very useful for managers, since it allowed the calculation of fire susceptibility, vulnerability and fire damage, according to several climatic scenarios. It also allowed the incorporation of different paths regarding different fire risk conditions and the minimization of risk due to fire damage through different management responses.

Mapping Forest Fire Risk and Development of Early Warning System for NW Vietnam Using AHP and MCA/GIS Methods

“…To determine the weights of the components, this study used a pairwise comparative analysis (AHP), which is a method applied to multi-objective decision problems [28]. In this study, the opinions of many experts [6,11,29,30] were referenced to construct a comparison matrix for nine classes of information for the construction of the forest fire risk map relating to: forest cover (FC), humidity (HM), elevation (EL), distance to roads (DT), slope (SL), stream density (SD), slope direction (SI), distance to fields (UF), and the distance to residential areas (RA) (Table 3).…”

Integrating erosion risk into forest management in Catalonia, Spain

“…Integrating risk in forest management planning has been undertaken for fire (e.g. González et al 2005, Costa Freitas et al 2017, wind (e.g. Gardiner and Quine 2000;Heinonen et al 2009), snow (e.g.…”

A Homogeneity Test for Comparing Gridded-Spatial-Point Patterns of Human Caused Fires

“…From the perspective of HCF management, the fact that a set of years or periods can be considered similar signifies the presence of a similar spatial pattern in terms of the risk of fire (possibility of fire starting due to the presence of causative agents [25]). This may indicate the existence of some pattern in the cause of HCFs with results in the presence of fire-prone areas.…”

“…Ref. [25] points out that the risk of fire is one factor that managers should consider in managing forests in order to propose fire protection programs. Specific fire prevention (e.g., fuel treatment practices, firebreaks, distribution of firefighting resources, etc.)…”