Brussels, 20/08/2007 (Agence Europe) - With the forest fire season barely started, available figures on forest fires in the EU show that July 2007 was one of the worst-ever months on record. This was revealed in figures released at the beginning of August by the European Forest Fire Information System's the Joint Research Centre (JRC).
According to provisional figures released by the European Commission on 2 August, 3376 square kilometres of land has already been burned in 2007, compared to a total of 3585 square kilometres in 2006. On the basis of consolidated figures, Barbara Helfferich, the spokesperson for European Commissioner for the environment, Stavros Dimas, explained that the European Commission would be drawing up a summary report with a breakdown for each country. This report would serve as the basis for planning and controlling forest fires in the future.
Following warnings of high fire risk at the end of June in countries such as Greece and Cyprus, the second half of July saw a sharp increase in fires and burnt areas in Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece and Italy. Using satellite images to map all fires affecting an area of more than 50 hectares in these four countries alone showed a total of 2229 square kilometres of burnt land. Figures for some other countries that have experienced major fires, such as Turkey and Albania, have yet to be included in EFFIS. Spain has, via the European Commission, activated the International Charter "Space and Major Disasters" that aims at providing a unified system of satellite imagery acquisition and delivery to those affected by natural or man-made disasters.
Data on EU forest fires has been drawn up for Spain, Italy France and Greece since 1985. This has existed for new member states since 2004.
Through the European Commission's intermediary, the Joint Research Centre (JRC), together with its DG Environment, Member States are provided with daily fire risk warnings and subsequent damage assessments. This risks are updated on a daily basis an warnings are sent to member states' civil and forestry protection services every day during the period from 1 February to 31 October.
The EFFIS also facilitates information exchange between member states. Satellite based mapping, which provides on the ground spatial resolution of 250 metres, means that analysis of big fires as well as preliminary analysis of the effects of these fires on European forests and conservation areas (like the Natura 2000 network) can be made. (an)