‘Like smoking a cigarette’: Indonesia chokes on haze as blazes intensify amid super ‘El Niño’
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- Indonesia has seen nearly 94,000 hectares burn in July alone, with fires concentrated in Kalimantan and Sumatra, driven by land-clearing practices and dry weather linked to a 'super' El Niño.
- Prabowo Subianto ordered the revocation of business permits for corporations suspected of directing illegal land burns, following rising public frustration over government inaction.
- Indonesian police arrested 72 people across Borneo and Sumatra on suspicion of deliberately setting fires to clear land for palm oil and pulp plantations.
- West Kalimantan health authorities reported around 5,000 weekly emergency room visits for respiratory issues since July—ten times higher than the first half of the year.
- Malaysia and Brunei plan to raise the trans-boundary haze at ASEAN, as Kuala Lumpur became the world’s most polluted city and nearly 600 schools in Sarawak closed due to smoke and heat.
- Experts, including climate scientist Justin Sentian, warn that degraded peatlands—drained for plantations—are now fire-prone and produce harder-to-extinguish underground blazes with toxic smoke.
Why it matters: The surge in respiratory cases and school shutdowns shows immediate human cost, while corporate permit revocations mark a rare enforcement step against powerful plantation interests. With peatland fires resistant to suppression and El Niño expected to peak in September, the window for containment is narrowing before October's extended dry season.
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