BNPB's Head of Disaster Data, Information, and Communication Center Abdul Muhari stated on Friday that the posts, located in all forest and land fire-prone areas, are operated by a ground task force.
The ground task force comprises 50 personnel from the Indonesian Defense Forces (TNI) and the National Police (Polri), karhutla volunteers, the Ministry of Forestry's Manggala Agni, and local governments through their respective district and city Disaster Mitigation Agencies (BPBD).
"We continue to monitor the escalation of forest and land fires. If the situation escalates, we will form a special task force, similar to those in West Kalimantan and Riau, where each district and city will be reinforced with 100 soldiers and 100 police officers," Muhari remarked.
Following direct instructions from the environment minister and the BNPB head during a coordination meeting on forest and land fires on Thursday (August 7), Muhari stressed that all regional stakeholders must collaborate to strengthen and speed up ground firefighting efforts once hotspots are detected, even though aerial firefighting instruments have been deployed.
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He remarked that the agency has prepared five-ton water tanks, two water-bombing helicopters, and one weather modification aircraft over the past two days.
"Aerial firefighting is essential for covering areas inaccessible to ground teams. However, the ground task force remains efficient due to its most direct and targeted approach," Muhari explained.
Preparedness is considered critical since Central Kalimantan, with its peatland areas, is one of the six priority provinces for forest and land fire management, along with Riau, Jambi, South Sumatra, West Kalimantan, and South Kalimantan.
Based on the Ministry of Forestry's forest and land fire indication map from January to June 2025, approximately 8,594 hectares of land have burned, with peatlands accounting for more than 80.15 percent of the affected areas.
Of the six priority provinces, West Kalimantan recorded the largest burned areas at 1,149 hectares, followed by Riau with approximately 751 hectares, Central Kalimantan with 146 hectares, and Jambi and South Sumatra with 43 hectares.
However, there have been no reports on the extent of the fires in South Kalimantan.
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Translator: M. Riezko Bima, Resinta Sulistiyandari
Editor: Rahmad Nasution
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