August 9, 2025 | 03:57 pm
TEMPO.CO, Jakarta – National Police Chief General Listyo Sigit Prabowo has confirmed that the number of hotspots that could trigger forest and land fires in West Kalimantan continues to decline. He made this announcement after a briefing on the fire mitigation at the BPPTD Building in Mempawah, West Kalimantan, on Friday, August 8, 2025.
Listyo Sigit explained that cross-sector coordination in handling the fires has been effective. Based on reports from June to August, the decrease in hotspots has been significant.
"Yesterday, there were still about 32 hotspots, if I'm not mistaken. Over the past two days, that number has decreased even more, and I also saw that weather modification has been successful. This will certainly help significantly in extinguishing the existing fire spots," he said in a statement received by Tempo on Saturday, August 9, 2025.
Collaborative Strategy and Community Education
The Police Chief highlighted the solid strategy involving the Police, TNI (Indonesian Military), BNPB (National Disaster Mitigation Agency), BMKG (Meteorology, Climatology, and Geophysics Agency), as well as volunteers and local communities. The division of tasks is clear, with ground task forces handling on-site extinguishing and air task forces using water bombing and weather modification to induce rain.
Sigit also stressed the importance of educating residents who still clear land by burning. While he acknowledged the existence of local wisdom, he emphasized that these practices must comply with regulations.
"I suggest that since there is still local wisdom in clearing land, please comply with the existing rules. How to clear the land following local wisdom certainly has rules, there are boundary lines, and it must be supervised until it is finished and no more burning," Sigit said.
He encouraged the community to adopt safer methods. "Our recommendation is to open land without the need to burn," he added.
In his closing statement, Sigit invited all parties to maintain their synergy in preventing forest and land fires, noting that the issue is of direct concern to President Prabowo Subianto.
"I would like to express my gratitude for the hard work of the entire team involved in the fire task force. Because this is the concern of Pak President, I ask the team to continue to maintain its compactness and hopefully, we can surpass the time until the end of August and forest fires can be truly maintained," he said.
Forest Fires in West Kalimantan
Previously, Minister of Environment and Forestry Hanif Faisol Nurofiq stated that while West Kalimantan had been free of hotspots on Saturday, August 2, 2025, the potential for new fires remains until the dry season ends. He stressed that "preventive measures must be prioritized by all parties."
West Kalimantan, with its 14.7 million hectares, includes 2.7 million hectares of peatlands. Around 19 percent of the province is highly prone to fires that are difficult to extinguish.
Up until July 31, 2025, the province had recorded 1,500 hotspots. Of these, 258 were confirmed as active fires, impacting an area of 989 hectares. These fires were managed by 195 fire alert personnel from various government, private, and community groups.
M. Faiz Zaki contributed to this report.
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