FIREFIGHT Mediterranean Region

WWF project 9Z0731.01

An analysis of key issues that underlie forest fires and shape subsequent fire management strategies

in 12 countries in the Mediterranean basin

Final Report May 2001

Alcyon and the scientists that participated in the preparation of this report would like to express their sincere thanks to all those who helped them come up with a result that, hopefully, adds a little help to facing the problem of forest fires in the Mediterranean. Particular thanks go to WWF and IUCN, as well as on a personal basis to Pedro Regato at WWF MedPO, Stephanie Mansourian at WWF International, and Peter Moore, co-ordinator of Project FireFight South East Asia for their assistance and constructive comments. Also, to Aristotelis Papageorgiou at WWF Greece for all the advice and information provided, and to all the people who took time to discuss with the project team and fill in questionnaires. Proposed Reference Title: Dimitriou, A., Mantakas, G., Kouvelis, S.,: An analysis of key issues that underlie forest fires and shape subsequent fire management strategies in 12 countries in the Mediterranean basin. Final report prepared by Alcyon for WWF Mediterranean Programme Office and IUCN. May 2001.

CONTENTS

Introduction

1. A Profile of forest fires in the Mediterranean 1.1 Forest fires in numbers

Number of fires Burned forest area Direct causes of forest fires

1.2 Impacts 1.3 Legislation related to forest fires

Laws and guidelines of Mediterranean countries European Union guidelines

1.4 Actors involved in forest fire protection Spain Portugal Italy France Greece Turkey Lebanon Cyprus Other countries Summary and conclusions

1.5 International actors involved in forest fire protection European Union

United Nations Forestry cooperation in the Mediterranean

1.6 National and International funding on forest fires European Union funds

2. Root causes of forest fires in the Mediterranean 2.1 Socio-economic features related to forest fires 2.2 Sectoral policies

Forestry Civil protection Agricultural policy Tourism and tourist infrastructure development Urban development Transport networks Energy networks Waste dumps

2.3 Structural and strategic causes related to forest fires International cooperation Forest fire management Development policies

Case study: Root causes of forest fires in Greece 2.4 Conclusions

2.5 Countries forest fires root causes matrix

3. Gap analysis and responses 3.1 Identification of gaps in forest fire management

Strategy Technical aspects Information

3.2 Logical Framework / Strategic Plan on suggested WWF/IUCN activities

References

Introduction Forest fires occur because of anthropological or natural causes. Lightning is the most common natural cause of fire. The majority of fires around the world are however caused by human activity. It has been estimated that annually fires burn across up to 500 million hectares of woodland, open forests, tropical and sub-tropical savannas, 10-15 million hectares of boreal and temperate forest and 20-40 million hectares of tropical forests. In the countries surrounding the Mediterranean Sea, fire is the main cause of destruction of the natural vegetation. Each year about 50,000 fires reduce to ashes 700,000-1,000,000 ha of forestlands, causing tremendous ecological and economical loss. Thus, wildfires seem to be a permanent problem for all the Mediterranean countries. As a result, fire has been viewed by many as an environmental disaster over hundreds of years and has been linked, rightly in most cases, with reduced soil fertility, destruction of biodiversity, global warming and damage to forests, land resources and of course human assets. Contentions like these fail to make important distinctions about different types of fires. Fire is a paradox: it can kill plants and animals and cause extensive ecological damage but it can also be extremely beneficial, being the source of forest regeneration and nutrient recycling. Fire, the experts say, is nature's way of recycling the essential nutrients, especially nitrogen. For many boreal forests fire is a natural part of the cycle of the forest, and some tree species, notably lodgepole pine and jack pine are "serotinous" - their cones only open and seeds germinate after they have been exposed to fire. Fire in these circumstances is essential. Burning quickly decomposes organic matter into numeral components that cause a spurt of plant growth, and can also reduce disease in the forest. But it is important to remember that fires under extreme weather conditions can be devastating to these forests. In contrast, fire causes severe damage to tropical forest ecosystems, which are characterised by high levels of humidity and moisture. They do not normally burn and are extremely prone to severe fire damage. Research from Amazon is only just beginning to show us how long-lasting damage from fire can be on the tropical forest ecosystems. Fire has played, and will continue to play, a major role in shaping forest ecosystems throughout the world. The inter-relationship between humans, fire and forests is a complex one and has been the subject of countless studies and reports. Most ecosystems including the Mediterranean type among them, evolved in environments where wildland fires occurred regularly, establishing fire as a process that affects many ecosystem functions. Fire acts with different frequencies and intensities depending upon the vegetation and topography involved. Climatic regimes determine the occurrence of fire. Thus, vegetation composition, biomass and structure depend on climate and on fire frequency and intensity, while fire frequency and intensity depend in turn on vegetation biomass, structure, topography and climatic regimes.

Periodic forest, grassland, and shrubland fires are part of the natural environment - as natural and vital as rain, snow, or wind. Evidence of past fires is found in charcoal layers in lakes and bogs and in the fire-scarred cross sections of trees. Recurring disturbances by fire are essential to the functioning of many ecosystems, termed "fire-dependent". Many examples are available to describe how fire affects the functioning of ecosystems, such as influencing plant succession, fuel accumulations, structure and composition of vegetation, insect and disease populations, nutrient cycling, productivity, diversity and habitats for wildlife. Regions of the Mediterranean have suffered large, disastrous fires whose occurrence demonstrates violent fire behavior. The frequency and intensity of these fires is promoted by certain factors of the Mediterranean environment, such as:

A. The Mediterranean climate itself with the prolonged summer drought, high temperatures and strong local winds creates extremely high fire risk. As a consequence of dry weather and high temperatures (> 30o C), the moisture content of dead fine fuels decreases below 10%, thus increasing greatly the ignition probability. A small heat source is sufficient to start a fire. Prevailing winds cause a further decrease in atmospheric humidity and also contribute to fast fire spread, crowing and spotting.

B. The type of fuels. Mediterranean type vegetation itself (maquis, gariggue or phrygana and low elevation pine forests such as P. halepensis and P. brutia forests) has inherent chemical, physical and physiological properties that increase its flammability with age (VELEZ 1986). On the other hand this type of vegetation has developed distinct adaptation mechanisms to ensure their survival to recurrent wildfires: i. Vegetative reproduction through abundant resprouting after fire, and, ii. Fire stimulated seed germination in species in which heat treatment is a prerequisite for the break of dormancy or the cone opening. Thus, Mediterranean type vegetation is well adapted in a fire environment presenting unique adaptation characteristics to fire. At the same time its strongly flammable character serves as a provoking mean for frequent and intense fires.

C. The Mediterranean basin has been populated since thousands of years. It is the origin of the first cultures of humanity that developed agriculture, built cities and used timber for commercial purposes. The presence of human for this long period has shaped an anthropogenic forest landscape, where the fire is often the result of his pressure on the environment.

Fire as a natural force seems to be a deterministic factor in fashioning, positioning and developing the numerous Mediterranean plant communities and this happened long before man’s appearance on earth. But as far as man understood its role it became the most important tool of mankind to clear forestlands with the most simple, quick and cheap way (VIEGAS 1997).

Lightning, volcanoes and people have been igniting fires in wildland ecosystems for millennia. The current emphasis on managing ecosystems highlights interactions between disturbance processes and ecosystem functions. Land managers and fire managers need to understand the historic frequency, intensity and the real extend of past fires. The project Firefight Mediterranean was assigned from WWF Mediterranean and IUCN to Alcyon as a baseline review in order to identify the root causes and main actors that lie at the basis of forest fires in the region. Its objective is to have a clear indication as to what is the optimal and feasible line of intervention of WWF and IUCN in order to address the problem of wild catastrophic forest fires, and which are the mechanisms and potential partners that need to be taken into account. This report provides an overview of the situation in the region, givin a detailed analysis for each country to the extent that is possible on the basis of the data and information that exist. It looks into the issue of forest fires taking into account both natural and socio-economic conditions. Finally, the information presented is analysed in the context of a gap analysis that leads to a logical framework outlining the course of action to be taken by WWF / IUCN.

1. A profile of forest fires in the Mediterranean 1.1. Forest fires in numbers The aim of this chapter is to present a review of the key issues that describe forest fires in the Mediterranean and to give a clear picture of the trends of forest fires in the region over time. To do this, the study has used data from various sources, drawing mainly on FAO. Consolidated data for the region is hard to find. Although the report uses this data for providing a global picture of the region, the reader should be aware that the data is in some cases not directly comparable with any statistical precision, since different countries follow different methodologies of collecting data. Regional and global collection of fire statistics is conducted at present under the auspices of ECE/FAO (for the ECE region) and FAO (ECE/FAO 1995, FAO 1992). In 1995 a meeting on fire statistics, held in Geneva, concluded that the approach pioneered in the EU (European Commission 1996) should be extended around the Mediterranean. The Commission of the European Communities would provide technical support to this work and to process data for new countries and the FAO/Silva Mediterranea forest fire network would contribute to establishing contacts, encouraging the setting up of such systems and ensuring international comparability. However, it would be many years before all countries, even in Europe, were able to supply the type of detailed information required by the fire-by-fire approach. Official statistics usually refer to three main measures, in order to describe forest fires: number of fires, areas burned and direct causes. Number of fires Large fluctuations occur from year to year, mainly due to the differences of climatic conditions (humidity, temperature, wind). The case of two different countries, Morocco and Spain is presented in figures 1 and 2. Fluctuations appear in the number of fires in both countries, but in the case of Spain we observe a rather increasing trend over the years. The same trend is observed for Albania, Greece, Portugal and Turkey. The number of fires for the countries of the study for a period of 20 years (1978 – 1997) is presented in Table 1 of Appendix I, based on the FAO (1999) report.

Figure 1: Number of fires in Morocco from 1978 to 1996

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Figure 2: Number of fires in Spain from 1978 to 1997

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The average number of fires per country for the period 1978 – 1997 is presented in figure 3. Spain, Italy and Portugal show the highest average numbers of fires with a large difference to the rest, followed by France, Turkey and Greece. The other countries have less than 1000 fires per year in average.

Figure 3: Average number of fires for the period 1978 - 1997

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In order to describe the development of the number of fires over time, independently from the fluctuations due to the climate, we compare the percentage of change of the decade average of all countries in figure 4. Figure 4: Change in the number of fires (%), between the decades 1978-1987 and

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Portugal shows a remarkable increase of close to 4 times the number of fires between the two decades. A large increase is also observed in the case of Albania, Greece, Spain and Turkey. The number of fires in Cyprus has decreased to half. The other countries show minor changes from decade to decade.

The differences in numbers of forest fires from country to country can originate from various reasons. In some countries the actors involved in forest fire suppression – who also record the number of fires – have changed, i.e. the shift from Forest Service to

the Fire Brigade in Portugal. This may have affected greatly the number of fires recorded, since the firemen have a different operation modus and training and may give different definitions to “forest fire”. An example is given for the case of Greece, where the Fire Brigade that took over forest fire suppression in 1998 records all non-urban fires of all size, since they measure “incidents”, i.e. times that they had to operate. The Forest Service used to separate fires in the forest from ones occurring on agricultural land and never recorded fires that burned less than an area of 0.1 ha. As a result, the number of fires in Greece has grown three times from 1997 to 1998!

Other reasons for the differences observed may be changes in the political system (Albania, Croatia) or in some cases war and rebellions (Albania). For some of the countries, especially in North Africa and Middle East, a reduction in the number of fires may have been caused simply because there was a reduction in the forest cover, due to overexploitation. Burned forest area An overview of the total burned areas can be found in table 2 of Appendix I, based on FAO (1999). As expected, fluctuations exist between the values of different years. The largest areas burned are observed in the northern Mediterranean countries, namely Spain, Italy, Portugal and Greece, as shown in Figure 5. Figure 5: Average burned areas for the period 1978 - 1997

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In order to describe the development of the burned areas over time, a comparison between the average values in the period covered by the existing data from FAO (1999) is presented in figure 6. North African countries, Cyprus and Turkey do not show large differences, while Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain show a clear trend of increase. The burned areas have almost doubled in these countries between the 60s and the 70s and between the 70s and the 80s. The small decrease in the 90s is probably not correct, since the severe damages of the years 1998 and 1999 were not calculated.

The reasons for this phenomenon seem to be connected with economic development and urbanization. During the 70s and the 80s, the south EU countries have shifted their economic activities from agriculture to industry, commerce and tourism (FAO, 1992; see also next chapter). Land abandonment and lack of traditional activities, such as small-scale agriculture and pasture, have caused fuel accumulation, which favored the outbreak of catastrophic large fires (ALEXANDRIAN and ESNAULT 1999; VELEZ 1999). At the same time, the expansion of cities and the new land uses that have appeared, such as tourism, have created tensions to the forests. As a result, forests on remote mountainous areas burn because of biomass accumulation and lowland, coastal forests burn because land is converted to other land uses. Countries of Northern Africa and Middle East experience a heavy urbanization too, but the size of rural population remains constant or increases, due to the general population increase (see next chapter). This is a problematic situation too, because land use conversion around the cities is combined with overexploitation in rural areas. The low number of forest fires in them is probably not a positive sign, since it could probably be the result of a heavy deforestation, which has happened with means other than fire (overgrazing, logging for fuelwood, etc.). Another aspect is the change of the nature of land management over the decades. In many Mediterranean countries, large plantations have replaced traditional small-scale forestry, leading to a more intense economic activity. This has resulted in a dramatic decrease of forest quality, since many old growth forests have been replaced by poor coppiced stands. This is the case especially in Northern Africa, where over-exploitation has lead to a serious increase of coppice forest and the conditions favoring forest fires have increased (Regato, personal communication). Other reasons, such as war or sudden political changes were the reason behind severe damages, as seems to be the case in Cyprus in 1974 and Albania after 1993 (FAO 1999).

Figure 6: Change of average burned areas between the decades

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A big problem nowadays is the continually increasing damage caused by a small number of fires of high intensity and spreading. During 1994 in Spain, 79 forest fires out of a total of 20 000 ravaged 80% of the total burned surface. A similar trend was described for France (VALLAOURI, personal communication). This happened mostly due to fuel accumulation over large areas as a result of the abandonment of rural land (VELEZ 1997). Forest fires are part of the Mediterranean ecosystem and society, and small-scale fires may always be expected. On the contrary, large catastrophic fires do not fit within the ecological cycle and constitute a major problem. Such phenomena show that there are problems in the policy and patterns of land management and rural development. It is significant to note that no country shows an improved situation, despite all the measures taken (Le Houérou, 1987). Summarizing on the data on burned areas, we can conclude on an increasing tendency in countries of South Europe. The reasons for this increase lies probably in several complex social and economic changes, connected mainly with urbanization, rural abandonment and changes in land uses. Three major conclusions come out of the data presented: • The development that has occurred during the last decades – and still goes on –

caused many problems in almost all Mediterranean countries, with forest fires as one of the results. Sectoral policies (if existing) were either wrong or not able to predict the trends in land use planning and to include aspects such as fire hazard.

• The governments have failed to protect the forest (burned or not) from the pressures caused by other land uses and could not stop land conversion and reduction of forest quantity and quality.

• The countries with the largest forest fire problem and the most dramatic increase in burned areas are usually the most prosperous ones, having expensive fire

suppression means, such as airplanes and vehicles. This paradox indicates clearly that the fire fighting approach used is wrong and measures that deal with deeper causes of forest fires need to be taken.

Direct causes of forest fires Although statistics on the causes of the forest fires in the Mediterranean region are incomplete, it is evident that the majority of fires are set by humans. The main fire causes for a period of 10 (1988-1997) years are shown on the following table (ANONYMOUS 1997): Table 1. Main fire causes in Mediterranean countries Arson Negligence Natural Unknown Croatia 4% 27% 4% 66% Cyprus 0% 22% 16% 62% France 7% 25% 4% 64% Greece 13% 20% 5% 62% Italy 55% 17% 1% 28% Portugal 31% 32% 2% 35% Spain 66% 12% 4% 18% Turkey 16% 41% 6% 37% The percentage of unknown causes is very high and does not allow a further analysis of the causes. Differences of this percentage between countries are large and probably connected with the accuracy and the credibility of the investigation mechanisms. Countries with low percentage of unknown causes have a high percentage of arsons and vise versa. In many cases, forest fires are declared as of unknown cause, when no one is willing to address the responsibility to cover the cost of the damages. For example, in Greece causes other than unknown are rarely recorded. In 1998, after a large fire that destroyed the largest part of the Taygetos forest, the Head of the Forest Service announced that the fire was caused by badly maintained electricity lines. The Public Electricity Company has sued him and the case is in court. The causes of fires sometimes are influenced by political situations. In some cases, governments claim that almost all forest fires were caused by arsonists, in order to avoid admitting the failure of the firefighting mechanism. The anthropogenic causes of forest fires can be classified in: Accidents or Negligence. A significant part of forest fires attributed to negligence is due to shepherds and farmers who set fire for forage improvement or crop residue removal and land clearing. Fires set for such purposes usually coincide with the hot and dry period of high fire risk, leading to large, uncontrolled wildfires. Other factors include the burning of household or garden refuse, fires resulting from forest workers, unattended or improperly extinguished campfires, carelessly thrown cigarettes, sparks from trains or electricity cables and military maneuvers. The root causes of accidental fires seem to be:

• wrong range and agriculture management techniques applied in many countries of the region,

• government inability to establish and apply simple managerial regulations for agriculture and pasture (such as season of burning, method),

• lack of information and awareness on the danger of some activities that can cause a fire in the forest,

• lack of planned development and incorporation of fire hazard in sectoral policies, especially in land use planning,

• lack of government control on industrial, military, waste and transportation networks and facilities cause very often fires due to bad maintenance,

• increase of sudden and badly planned development of recreational and sport activities of urban people in forest areas.

Deliberate ignition The following causes exist more or less in all the countries around the Mediterranean. The probability of occurrence (high or low) in each country may be different and depends on the effectiveness of forest organization, the political will and the public awareness, but in general there are common trends in the majority of the countries

• fires lit to regain grazing land and to renew the herbaceous cover • fires started for personal revenge • fires started from conflicts related to political reasons or even to forest policy • fires started by illegal hunters to aid hunting operations • fires started through arguments over public or private wildland ownership • fires started to cause timber prices to drop • fires started as an attempt to change land use classification, specially in

regions of great interest to urban development and tourism • fires started by pyromaniacs

In many countries fires are considered as an “enemy” and the prevention policy is strict. For example in Greece it is forbidden to light a fire in the open between April and October. Shepherds who use fire for the amendment of pasturelands are illegal and are often prosecuted. This illegal burning is performed in the wrong time and most often at the wrong place, without scientific guidance for avoiding ecological damage or special measures for avoiding the spreading of fire. In conjunction with the large biomass accumulation it is almost inevitable to avoid damage. In Italy, for example, 70 000 ha were burned in 1998 only due to shepherds. A lot of catastrophic consequences would be avoided if prescribed burning was legal and organized by the authorities (VELEZ, 1997). In many Mediterranean countries, there is a very important pressure for housing development along the line between urban and forest land, as well as an explosion of tourist development. At the same time, in some countries (e.g. Greece) the legislation concerning tenure and land use is incomplete and overlapping, creating confusion and opportunities for delinquencies (WWF GREECE 1999a, WWF GREECE 1999c). In summing up, the root causes of deliberate starting of forest fires are:

• unclear legislation about tenure and land use (Greece, Turkey), combined with the high political cost for governments to resolve this problem, constitute an

incentive for land grabbers and other opportunists for succeeding a land use change of the burned forest,

• lack of serious investigation of forest fire causes (large percentage of “unknown causes” in all countries) often makes arson a crime with low risk,

• decline of forestry due to demographic reasons and low prices of timber and other forest products,

• fuel accumulation because of rural abandonment and decline of traditional land uses and management.

• wrong range and agriculture management techniques applied in many countries of the region,

• governmental inability to establish and apply simple managerial regulations for agriculture and pasture,

• lack of planned development and incorporation of fire hazard in sectoral policies, especially in land use planning.

1.2 Impacts The impacts of forest fires are neither homogenous, nor identified to the same level of detail in all Mediterranean countries. In most cases, due to the deficiencies in the forest fire data collection methodology, only the direct impacts (i.e. burned area, damages to houses and agricultural cultivations) are reported. However, this information is clearly insufficient to determine the direct and indirect impacts to nature and the ecosystems, as well as the social and economic web of a given region. Forest fires have impacts both on the natural ecosystem, and an important distinction should be made regarding the obvious and usual statistical information, such as burned area and type of cover (wooded, shrubland etc). On the contrary, the importance of the ecosystem that was affected by a fire, as regards the presence of rare or endemic species, the impacts that fire had on the services provided by the ecosystem as regards water retention, wildlife habitat or corridor, and the extent of reversibility of the damage and the need for human intervention, are some of the impacts at a nature level that are almost never recorded. On the social and economic side the case is very similar. Records include the impacts of fires to houses, buildings and agricultural facilities and produce, such as sheds, livestock and crops. The damage to private or public infrastructure like telecommunications or energy networks is also recorded. On the contrary, the indirect and long term effects to te economy and society of an affected region is not recorded, an no projection are made so as to estimate the future effects of fire in the socio-economic life of the region. For example, the effects of forest fire in an agricultural or tourist area, go far beyond the direct effects to households, facilities and infrastructure. In order to calculate the real cost to society (to monetary terms as well as non-monetary values) one has to know what is the need for substitution of goods and means of production, the alternative employment opportunities for those who have lost some or all of their their productive investment, the damage to the public image of a tourist area (as regards both natural attractiveness and security). Also, the changes a fire may cause in the social web of a region, either by creating or re-enforcing an trend of abandonment of

agricultural practices (especially from young people who may not be prepared tpo wait the years it takes until a prennial plantation –like olives- has become productive again) as well as the immigration that may follows the loss of productive investments, in order to face up to the economic damage. Finally, health problems induced in the long term as a result of the loss of vegetation and species and changes in dietary patterns are some of the indirect, long term effects, to mention but a few. The research has shown that there are no records in any of the Mediterranean countries reviewed in the context of this project where such data on the impacts of forest fires are collected. Some of this information may be found usually by extrapolation and projection form the primary data that exist on forest fires, but this may happen only at exceptional cases of specific interest to some ineterst group (e.g. NGO, Hotel Owners etc.) and is never the result of a uniform state policy. Because of the lack of such information, it is clear that the estimation of the cost of the impacts of forest fire is much lower than the real one. As a result, the only cost that is really taken into account is the one of forest fire suppression means, while the real cost to society in terms of productive infrastructure and social expenses or opportunity cost is not taken into account in policy making. From the analysis of the impacts of forest fires in the Mediterranean region the following conclusions can be drawn:

• The impacts of forest fires can be distinguished in two broad categories; those

which can be measured or estimated approximately in monetary terms (direct impacts) and those whose estimation in monetary terms is very difficult (indirect impacts).

• Although the estimation of the total impact of forest fires (direct and indirect) is of great importance for policy and planning, it is usually not taken seriously into account. This could be related to the poor or/and insufficient planning as well as the lack of adequate forest policy, which among others constitute the fundamental causes of forest fires.

• Data on the direct impacts of forest fires is very limited, scattered in several sources and usually not so reliable. Moreover, whenever such data exists, it simply refers to information concerning areas burned from forest fires, not mentioning at all other important issues such as the ecological or economic impacts of forest fires.

• Indirect impacts of forest fires, although difficult to be estimated, are very important since they are closely related to the basic ecosystem functions as well as people’s quality of life.

• Research on fundamental impacts of the forest fires such as loss in biodiversity and genetic diversity, loss of plants and animal populations and species is absent in most of the Mediterranean countries.

• Due to data limitations concerning the total impacts of forest fires, their importance does not constitute a major issue in public awareness campaigns.

1.3 Legislation related to forest fires Laws and guidelines of Mediterranean countries Several Mediterranean countries have developed legislative tools to enhance protection of forests from fire. The existing data on this issue are hard to find, since laws and regulations are scattered and incorporated within different policy frameworks, such as forest operational laws and police regulations. The relevant legislation was not developed following a specific and complete fire management policy. Most regulations came as a response to the identification of causes. Since this issue is rather problematic, more investigation in necessary, in order to develop the proper legislative framework. In order to reduce accidental fires associated with infrastructure and its use (roads, railways, waste dumps, power lines, etc.) almost all countries in the Mediterranean have established regulations and punishment is foreseen for those found responsible. Although the identification of the causes of accidental fires is generally easy, their prevention is generally poor (Alexandrian et al 1999). Most of the Mediterranean countries have established severe penalties associated with deliberately set fires. In a number of cases - e.g. Portugal and Israel (Rosenberg, 1986) - the punishments were made more severe after the country experienced a wave of arson. It has been observed, nevertheless, that the heavier the punishments provided by the law, the more difficult it is to prove arson and the more the courts hesitate to condemn arsonists (Goldammer, 1986). The majority of Mediterranean countries have a variety of legal instruments to punish the guilty parties in the case of a forest fire. The punishments for deliberately set fires are always much more severe than those for involuntary fire. They range from forced work - e.g. in Morocco (Zitan, 1986), Algeria (Grim, 1989) and Tunisia (Chandoul, 1986) - or imprisonment of only a few months (e.g. in Cyprus) to life imprisonment (e.g. in France). Many countries have regulations that prohibit the use of fire in forests and near their boundaries during the period regarded as high risk, including on privately owned land (i.e. Greece). Infraction of these regulations is generally punished by way of a fine, which is sometimes very high. Other countries (Spain, Italy, France, Cyprus) prohibit access to forests both with the aim of prevention and to promote civil safety (Goldammer, 1986). In Turkey, public policy and legislation to prohibit agricultural burning near forest boundaries during fire season to reduce fire risk has actually had the opposite effect. The ban is not working, since 15 percent of the fires are due to agricultural burning, the largest single cause of forest fires. Consideration is being given to modifying this legislation to permit agricultural burning under controlled conditions coupled with farmer training in better burning practices (Biglili 1997). There are similar management regulations within the forest legislation for the prevention of fires throughout the Mediterranean basin. It is based on the creation of tracks, firebreaks and water reserves. This work is often designed within the framework of traditional management projects (e.g. in Algeria and Tunisia). Maintenance of these networks is often a problematic issue, especially as the

authorities responsible for creating the systems are often not the same as those who are responsible for maintaining them (Alexandrian et al 1999). Several countries (France, Israel, Italy. Spain and Turkey) have adopted provisions in their forestry laws aimed at obliging forest owners to clear the undergrowth along roads and/or railways (Goldammer, 1986). Undergrowth clearance can be interpreted as a measure of prevention (aimed at preventing ignition) as well as a measure of pre-suppression (aimed at making roads safe). In France, the law obliges owners to clear the undergrowth within a perimeter of 50 m around their house (self-protection). In Lebanon, the Ministry of Agriculture directs people, NGO’s and municipalities to prune forest trees at least near roads to reduce "ladder fuels" and prevent crown fires (Bassil 2000). In France, fire prevention measures, e.g. fuel breaks are planned at the scale of an entire forested area (massif forestier) without differentiating between ownerships. The private owners have to be convinced of the necessity and utility of proposed projects. In the rare case of refusal, a judicial proceeding in order to dispossess the owner is possible, but not recommended (Teusan 1995). In Greece, a Fire Brigade Regulation is released every year in spring, obliging landowners, mayors and other local authorities to clear the understory in the area of their responsibility, especially next to the roads. In reality, this provision is little applied because of the expense of such an operation and the opportunity cost of this form of land use (Alexandrian et al 1999). Furthermore, difficult and intense control from the side of the state is needed, which is practically impossible. All national laws, regulations and other institutional tools mentioned above, aim at fighting forest fires from an operational approach. Although they are necessary, they are not really effective on the ground, as experience has shown, since they are not incorporated within a broader strategy against forest fire. They seem to respond spontaneously to the direct causes and fail to include the root causes of forest fires in the different countries. Some Mediterranean countries have tried to deal with land conversion and have adopted laws about the future of burned areas, in order to block land use change and discourage future arsonists and land grabbers. Even reforestation is sometimes an action foreseen by law, for example the Greek and Turkish constitutions mandate the reforestation of burned areas, and similar legislation exists in Portugal and in Spain. In Greece, the constitution has a special article (117) for burned forests, which declares all such areas protected by the state. The forest law that expressed the constitution obliges the Forest Service to present a detailed map of the burned forest within two months after fire and a special regulation is released. This was never implemented on the ground, since the forest legislation has other contradicting regulations, about “exceptions” concerning the ability of converting forests to something else due to “public benefit”. This has helped persons and social groups with political power to succeed expansion of urban plans within the forests (WWF Greece 1999c). In France, the scattered construction near and in forested areas is a major problem in the southeastern part of the country. In 1992 this led to a decree that instituted a plan of risk zones. It authorizes local communities to classify their territory in function of the fire risk into categories and to prevent construction (buildings) in wildfire prone

areas or to apply restrictive measures. The communities also have to manage their domestic waste dumps in a way that prevents spontaneous combustion (Teusan 1995). Some Mediterranean countries (Greece, Turkey) do not have clear legislation describing the boundaries between properties and land use forms. In Greece, a forest cadastre was first decided with a law in 1836 and was never implemented (WWF Greece 1999a). The current law of 1999 has initiated the procedure again, but a recent decision by the EU to reduce funds given for this task has opened questions about the implementation of a national cadastre. Borders separating public and private lands are not completely drawn in Turkey as well. Only in 30% of the country's total area are the ownership boundaries delineated. So, there are always ownership disputes and conflicts in and around forests and protected areas. People take advantage of this situation to increase their properties to the disadvantage of public forests (Biglili 1997). The tool they use is mostly fire. European Union guidelines EU regulations and guidelines are of great importance for the Mediterranean member states, since they are setting the framework of their national legislation. Furthermore, EU regulations influence accession and bordering countries and shape the general policy directions for all countries of the region. The Forestry Action Programme, which was adopted by the European Council in 1989 and was reviewed and strengthened in 1992, includes actions for protection against forest fires (Regulation No. 2158/92) with a budget of 70 MEuro for the period 1992-1996. Their purpose is to identify and eliminate the causes of forest fires and to improve forest monitoring systems. This programme is oriented primarily at what the EU defines as “fire prevention”, promoting measures such as the provision of forest paths, firebreaks, water supply points, clearing equipment and monitoring facilities, which should be actually classified under “pre-suppression”. A milestone in the EU legislation against forest fires was the Interministerial Seminar on Forest Fires in Lisbon (1992), that recommended improved forest fire prevention policies within a framework of enhanced public awareness, environmental education and identification of the social and individual motivations and behavior patterns that are responsible for the majority of forest fires. It was also recommended that a database of fire statistics should be compiled and member states were encouraged to help each other in the area of research of the causes of the fires, and to apply the legislation in force. All members of this seminar emphasized the need to define and reverse the underlying political and social causes of forest fires in Europe. However, the context of Regulation No. 2158/92 did not focus on the political and socio – economic causes of forest fires, as was requested by the interministerial seminar of Lisbon (1992), but included measures of a rather technical nature. Financial aid was distributed to the member states according to regulations that followed (1170/93, 1460/98 and 1727/99). Regulation (EC) No 804/94 of 11 April 1994 laid down certain detailed rules for the application of Council Regulation 2158/92 regarding forest-fire information systems. In order to set up an information system on forest fires, the Regulation asks the Member States to supply “minimum

common core of information”. Member States can apply for Community financing concerning such data collection, whether to implement or to improve forest fire information systems. On 17 September 1998, alarmed by the wave of fires throughout the Mediterranean region, the European Parliament stressed the heavy human and economic costs and the environmental damage to forests. It called on the Commission to make available, especially from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), the resources required to alleviate the damage suffered by the regions affected, to implement a Community forestry policy and to establish closer coordination between the Member States on preventing and fighting forest fires. Summarizing on the EU provisions within the framework of the European forest policy, we realize that although the need for a different approach is recognised – and described in official publications – the legislative measures themselves come up to measures that just arrange the financial aid given to countries for suppression or pre-suppression. EU legislation fails to connect forest fires with its own forest and agricultural policy and other sectoral policies that are related with the socioeconomic changes that happen in the southern part of the Union. Based on a Central / Northern European forestry dogma, the European forest policy focuses mainly on production and promotes fire fighting at an operational level. Forest fires are also included in the EU policy on civil protection. Its approach is a purely operational one, aimed at the quickest and most efficient mobilization of member states to help after a disaster occurs, inside or outside the European Union. The most significant achievements so far have been the establishment of several operational instruments, pilot projects and self-training workshops, the establishment of the Vade-Mecum of Civil Protection in the European Union and an extensive Research and Development effort. All civil protection initiatives at Community level are implemented on the basis of the subsidiarity principle laid down by the Maastricht Treaty. The Commission’s aim has been to support and encourage national efforts through a flexible legal and administrative basis. Experience in recent years has shown that the present system lacks the capacity to mobilise significant and sufficient resources from Member States and to coordinate interventions as required. In addition, Member States do not always make sufficient use of the existing structure and the support and coordination potential it offers. It also appears that Member States have not always been aware of the operational resources available and which could be provided as assistance, or of the possibility of mobilising these resources at an early stage of the emergency. Accordingly, the current system appears unable to meet the real need for intervention by Member States’ teams. According to a recent council decision, this clearly indicates the need for a significantly reinforced mechanism, as called for at the political level. Only a clear political will, expressed at the highest level, to use and take advantage of the proposed mechanism will guarantee its long-term effectiveness.

1.4 Actors involved in forest fire protection Different countries have different ways of organising their fight against forest fires. There is no comparative information about this issue for the countries of the study. Information about the system of some of the countries can be found in official reports given to FAO or EU, but almost all of them present just a short description of the actors and the procedures according to the official state dogma. Most descriptions are just lists of suppression means, especially airplanes, vehicles and firemen. There is no critical description of the weaknesses and advantages of the systems applied. This approach would be very useful for planning future activities and changes. The philosophy of forest fire prevention is similar throughout the Mediterranean basin. It is based on the creation of tracks, firebreaks and water reserves. This work is often designed within the framework of traditional management projects (e.g. in Algeria and Tunisia). Maintenance of these networks is an important issue, especially as the authorities responsible for creating the systems are often not the same as those who are responsible for maintaining them (Alexandrian et al 1999). Two general trends can be described within the countries of the Mediterranean, as far as protection from forest fires is concerned:

• a system where the Forest Service is responsible for forest fire prevention and suppression and

• a mixed system, where the Forest Service is responsible of forest fire prevention and the Fire Brigade takes over suppression and pre-suppression activities.

In some countries, the mixed system is more complex and local and national authorities are involved as well. Spain In Spain, the authority responsible for forest protection is the Ministry of Environment and especially the General Secretariat for the Protection and Conservation of Nature. Each Region has the right to decide who will be responsible for fire fighting. Usually, in forest-urban interface this task is assigned to the Fire Brigade, while the Forest Service is responsible for mountainous areas. Fire management activities of the different administrations are coordinated in the National Committee of Forest Fire Protection (CLIF). Prevention activities are developed after the 3rd Action Plan of Priorities (PAPIF 1996-99) (Velez 1998). In order to combat fires, there is a central disposal of 20 amphibian aircrafts available for the whole country while each Region rents on an annual basis the necessary number of helicopters (a total of 100 for the whole country). The General Direction for the Conservation of Nature makes a systematic effort to promote prescribed burning. Both Portugal and Spain give an emphasis in modern technologies for the early detection of forest fires through infrared detectors. However, statistics reveal that, in spite of sophisticated monitoring systems, fires are often first reported by local inhabitants (Alexandrian et al 1999).

Portugal Portugal has adopted the mixed system, where several institutions participate in the protection of the forest against fires, most of them acting at the national level, although there are some slight regional differences, due to the involvement of private or regional institutions (Viegas 1991). At the national level, the following services play the major role with their specific tasks:

• National Fire Brigade Service (Ministry of Internal Administration); in charge of coordinating fire suppression activities through more than 420 fire brigades, manned mostly by volunteers;

• Forest Service (Ministry of Agriculture); in charge of coordinating fire detection and advising the fire-fighters. It is also in charge of supervising reforestation activities, including on private land;

• Nature Conservation Institute (Ministry of Environment); a role similar to the Forest Service; but with particular focus on environmental matters;

• Civil Protection Service (Ministry of Internal Administration); in charge of supporting public protection, namely to handle situations in which areas have to be evacuated;

• Meteorology Institute (Ministry of Environment); supplies technical advice and support to the other institutions on weather conditions, namely, the daily fire danger index;

• National Association of Municipalities; represents the Mayors of the councils of Portugal, in charge of preparing and executing municipal plans for the protection of the forest in their councils; and,

• Private Foresters Association, a trade association of companies exploiting plantations for pulp production, and which have their own fire detection and fire fighting systems working in close cooperation with those of the government.

According to Viegas (1991), this complex system works efficiently due to a strong coordination among the agencies. However, it seems that the size of the area burned in Portugal has increased during the last decade. Italy

Forestry personnel, fire brigades, police, armed forces, workers, and volunteers are involved in fire supression in Italy. Emphasis is given in aerial rapid response and the Unified Aircraft Operations Centre coordinates all operations of the aeroplanes and helicopters belonging to the State Forestry Corps, the Air Force, the Army and the Navy. On the ground suppression is shared between the Forestry Corps and the Civil Protection Forces (Calabri 1990). In order to improve coordination and effectiveness, the National Civilian Protection Service was founded in 1992 (Law 225/1992) and in 1998 functions and administrative tasks were transferred from the State to the Regions and local organisations, in accordance with Law no. 59/1997 (Scipioni et al 1999). France

France applies a mixed system of fire fighting as well (Teusan 1995). For the surveillance of forest land all state services are mobilized (gendarmerie, national

police, forest service, the administration for agriculture and forestry, fire brigades, private forest owners and hunting associations). By law active fire fighting is the task of the fire brigades. In addition, a specially trained body was created in the sixties for the Mediterranean region: the fire fighting foresters (sapeur-forestier). For all actions in which the state is not directly involved a public association was established in 1963, which informs the public, tests new fire fighting equipment, trains specialists, maintains special services (e.g. a water bomber air base) or fire fighting equipment (e.g. retardants). Fire prevention measures, e.g. fuel breaks are planned at the scale of an entire forested area without differentiating between ownerships. For hazard reduction not only classical techniques, e.g. roller-chopping, are applied, but research is carried out to develop more efficient alternatives at low cost. Moreover, prescribed burning has been introduced and a network for prescribed burning was created six years ago. The coordinator is the National Institute for Agricultural Research (I.N.R.A.). France is investing much effort in the maintenance of agricultural clearings and forms of agro forestry hold an essential place among the management activities for areas at risk (Barthod 1996). Within the framework of the Agri-environmental Decree 207/92, the State is providing a total budget of 14.25 million French Francs a year over a period of 5 years, which is supplemented by the European Union, for promoting improvements to some 50,000 ha of land by farmers, based on an appropriate scales of charges. According to Barthod (1996), this policy combined with the strategy of fire surveillance and rapid intervention has shown great efficiency. Greece

Greece is the only country of the study, where official state reports make some criticism on the effectiveness of the fire fighting system. The organization responsible for forest fires in Greece until 1997 was the Forest Service. After a series of catastrophic years and especially after the loss of the urban forest of Thessaloniki in 1997, the government decided to pass the responsibility for forest fire fighting to the Fire Service, which until then was responsible for municipal fires, but also contributed to forest fire fighting. This happened finally in May 1998. Most aspects of fire prevention remained with the Forest Service. However, the Forest Service was weakened significantly as approximately one fourth of its personnel as well as many pieces of equipment (vehicles, radios etc) were moved to the Fire Service. The Fire Service clearly failed to control fires in 1998 (Xanthopoulos 2000), which was a year of intense drought. Forest fires proved to be quite different from municipal fires and this, combined with a difficult fire season, brought the burned area to 112 802 ha. After that, the Fire Service started an effort to prepare for forest fire fighting by training its personnel, preparing pre-suppression plans, acquiring appropriate equipment, creating additional fire stations in previously poorly protected areas and adopting the use of a daily fire danger prediction map through the summer months. The government supported the Fire Service fully, both morally and financially, ordering, among other measures, new water bombers and allowing contracting of additional private aircraft in 1999.

The fire season of 1999 was a relatively mild one and, with the help of the contracted aircraft, the results were extremely good (Xanthopoulos 2000). According to WWF Greece (1999b) the good results of this year were mainly due to the good weather conditions. As a result, although the Fire Service contracted an even larger number of aircraft for 2000, the difficulty of the fire season was high and a new record year of forest fire damages has happened. The burned area, exceeded 160 000 ha. Many weaknesses in fire fighting became evident. The Fire Service has a top-down structure and this is considered to be a significant advantage for the task of fire fighting as it allows easy mobility of resources between regions and good central coordination. On the other hand, the military-like structure of the Fire Service that includes army-equivalent ranks often results in fire fighting being coordinated not by the best-qualified people but by those of the highest rank (Xanthopoulos 2000). Furthermore, the Forest Service, which is responsible by law for fire prevention, has been broken down into a regional structure without provision for effective central coordination. This change has reduced its effectiveness, or at least made it completely variable by region. Also, its personnel have been reduced in number and the remaining employees are generally over 45 years old and retiring at a high rate. The number of employees is less than 2 800. This is clearly inadequate to successfully carry out all the forest management and protection tasks required. Range management is minimal and prescribed burning is only discussed at a theoretical level. Lack of appropriate funding for fire prevention work (e.g. fuel management) further compounds the problem. With poorly managed forests and fire prevention work practically non-existent the fire problem in the country, in meteorologically difficult fire seasons, can only be expected to worsen (Xanthopoulos 2000). Additionally to the weaknesses of the Forest Service and the Fire Service, the most serious gap of the system seems to be the lack of coordination (WWF Greece 1999b). This situation is even worse, considering the often bad relations between firemen and foresters, due to antagonism. Fire Service officers are called to coordinate suppression operations without knowing the relief and the vegetation of the area and without having experience on the behaviour of fire in the wild. Another state organization that is involved in forest fires is the General Secretariat for Civil Protection (GSCP). It was established by law in 1995 and was gradually organized in the late 1990s. It is part of the Ministry of Interior and has a coordinating role for all types of disasters, including forest fires. Both the Fire Service and the GSCP try to mobilize volunteers who will help in fire fighting and other disasters. The Army generally supports fire fighting activities upon request. During difficult periods soldiers undertake the task of surveillance and mop-up of fires that have been brought under control, reducing the number of fire-fighters needed to remain on site for this task. It also offers heavy equipment such as bulldozers upon request. The Police help in many ways during suppression operations and in arson investigations. To make the Greek system more complex, the government decided in the year 2000 to gradually pass forest fire prevention to the municipalities and other local authorities. This was done, in order to improve the absorption of EU funds for this purpose and to overcome the lack of personnel of the Forest Service. It is obvious that prevention is

understood by the state as clearing of the understory near the roads, surveillance and road maintenance. This new regulation not only makes the coordination of forest fire protection difficult, but also gives the opportunity to some stakeholders to establish constructions and roads in the forest under the excuse of fire prevention. It is a fact that in terms of aerial forces, Greece should probably be rated first in the world on a per-hectare-protected basis. However, the poor results of the last few years clearly indicate that there is need for improvement, especially in regard to knowledge and organization of the whole effort. Also, there is a clear need for better managed forests and serious fire prevention efforts. The latter objective requires an upgraded and modernized Forest Service that will work in close cooperation with the Fire Service (Xanthopoulos 2000). The Fire Service needs to improve its initial attack capability and be trained in indirect attack. The ground forces should learn to rely less on the help of aerial forces a good cooperation with the Forest Service is clearly necessary. The Forest Service needs a general update in all levels (personnel, equipment, political influence) (Xanthopoulos 2000). The Greek Parliament has voted a suggestion of an expert group to create one common coordination body, based mainly on the experience and the technical knowledge of the Forest Service. This step was never implemented, and as experience showed, Greece is moving towards the opposite direction (WWF Greece 1999b). Turkey Differing from the EU countries, the Forest Service in Turkey is under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Forests and is responsible for all measures in forest protection, including forest fire prevention and control (Serez 1995). A total of 640 "First Intervention Teams" consisting of 12 to 15 specially trained fire fighters are available for deployment for initial attack. For reinforcement 148 "Ready Force Teams" consisting of 40-50 fire fighters are on standby. Altogether 17,000 fire fighters are organized in these teams. Until 1985 forest fire suppression was exclusively based on ground-based technologies. Beginning in 1985 aerial fire observation and fire fighting has been introduced. The planes are rented from the Turkish Aviation Associations. An Aviation Group was formed, attached to the Forest Protection and Fire Fighting Department. Pilots and maintenance personnel are employed under contract for the helicopters (Serez 1995). Lebanon Forest fire protection is a very recent issue in Lebanon. The fire database was established in 1998. The civil defence, which operates under the Ministry of Interior, is responsible for fire control. The Ministry of Agriculture is also establishing a fire protection unit, operating a radio communication system, vehicles and tanks. The Lebanese army has three functional Bambi buckets that were used for the first time in 2000. To reduce forest fire risk, the Ministry of Agriculture coordinates groups of

people, NGO’s and municipalities to clear the forests near the roads. Water reservoirs next to forests and lookout towers for fire detection are planned for the near future (Bassil 2000). Cyprus In Cyprus, the government is responsible for fire prevention, detection, and suppression of wildland fires. For fires occurring in state forest land, the responsible authority is the Department of Forests of the Ministry of Agriculture, Natural Resources, and Environment. The prevention, pre-suppression, and suppression of these fires are the exclusive responsibility of this department. For private forests the prevention and suppression of fires are based on an action plan, according to which, the suppression of fires is shared between the Fire Brigade Service of the Ministry of Justice and Public Order and the Department of Forests and other government services. The preventive measures and the co-ordination of the suppression are handled by the District Officers of the Ministry of Interior. The detection of the fires in this category is based partly on the detection system of the Department of Forests and partly on other means (Hadjikyriakou 2000). The municipalities and the communities do not participate in the fire management activities, apart from the co-operation, to some degree, with the authorities involved. Furthermore, an effort is made to create voluntary groups in the various communities. Prescribed burning is not applied, as it is not favoured by the structure of the agricultural lands. Land-use practices are not employed as a tool to reduce wildfire hazards and risks. However, other measures are taken to reduce the wildfire hazards in the State Forest land, including mainly fuelbreaks along ridges, camping sites, roads, etc. The reduction of wildfire hazards in the privately owned-forested areas is not sufficient because the owners are not willing to co-operate. The government or the local communities construct fuelbreaks in a few places, but not as a part of agricultural, pastoral, or recreational activities. Wildfire risks are addressed through general education, information programs, and law enforcement (Hadjikyriakou 2000). Other countries North African countries have central forest authorities, being responsible for the whole range of forest fire protection. Summary and conclusions The EU countries apply the mixed fire protection system, with various players involved, strengthened through expensive fire suppression tools (mostly aerial). In the rest of the Mediterranean countries, forest authorities have the full responsibility for fighting fires in the forest. There are three main trends observed in relation to forest fire protection, moving from the south to the north of the Mediterranean:

• a trend from a central agency to a more peripheral system, • a trend for increased participation of private bodies in fire protection and • a trend of fire suppression from the forest services to professional firefighters.

Especially the third trend is actually a shift from a managerial approach to a more operational one. As prosperity and the means of countries for spending on fire fighting increase, the governments decide to invest their resources on a more complex system, where more different groups of professionals should work together. While this is principally correct, it includes a reduction of the participation of forest land managing authorities in the fire protection scheme, giving a more crisis-response character. This is especially true when one examines the huge expenses spent by governments and international agencies on suppression and pre-suppression, failing even to define prevention correctly. Another reason for this development is the fact that most people of the EU countries live in urban environments and cannot understand the managerial approach. For them fire is a bad thing and should be eliminated by all means a modern society may have. The advantages of the mixed fire protection system are:

• improvement of the effectiveness of detection and rapid response, • well trained personnel in fire suppression (not in all cases), • ability of using more personnel, expensive tools and high technology facilities.

The main disadvantages of the mixed forest fire system are:

• coordination between the agencies is an absolute prerequisite for the effectiveness of the system and this is not easily succeeded due to the differences in mentality, training and background,

• different players usually represent different policies and a common forest fire policy is not applied – or existing,

• forest fire management is a complex issue that needs feedback among all stages and cannot be separated in pieces.

While we recognise the need for the application of the best possible suppression measures, there should be a balance between all stages of forest fire protection. Suppression mechanisms should act complementary to the specific prevention and management measures, within the framework of a solid policy for forest fire protection. Since the problem of forest fires becomes more and more severe in the countries with the mixed system, a change in the policies and the decision mechanisms is necessary. These changes should not be understood as a comeback to the previous situations, when a central forest agency was in charge of fire management and suppression. The players involved in fire management are not the crucial question. What is important is the policy under which these players operate and their coordination. The data so far show that the current policy is not efficient. 1.5 International actors involved in forest fire protection International agencies and unions have developed policies and strategies to promote the protection of the Mediterranean countries from forest fires. Their role is in most cases theoretical. Treaties and agreements for cooperation exist, but only a few measures are taken on the ground.

Most agreements concerning forest fires are part of broader forestry policies, strategies for civil protection and environmental declarations. Furthermore, it seems that a holistic Mediterranean policy does not exist, since most organizations consider only parts of the Mediterranean, or cover an area much larger than the basin. European Union The European Union has measures for fire prevention (in fact pre-suppression) within its forest policy. The main EU Regulation on forest fires is 2158/92 that spent an amount of 70 MEuro for the period 1992-1996. Its context did not focus on the political and socio – economic causes of forest fires, but included mainly the classification of the Community territory according to forest-fire risk, the submission of forest fire protection plans from Member States whose territory is classified either partially or totally as a high-risk area and the establishment of a database to encourage information exchange on fires. On 17 September 1998 the European Parliament stressed the heavy human and economic costs and the environmental damage to forests. It called on the Commission to make available, especially from the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF), the funds required to alleviate the damage suffered by the regions affected, to implement a Community forestry policy and to establish closer coordination between the Member States on preventing and fighting forest fires. Regulation 1727/1999 of 28 July 1999 laid down certain detailed rules for the application of Regulation 2158/92, especially as far as financial arrangements are concerned. The EU policy on civil protection includes combating – among other catastrophes – forest fires and its implementation is important for the Mediterranean part of the European Union. Its approach is a purely operational one, aimed at the quickest and most efficient mobilization of member states to help after a disaster occurs, inside or outside the European Union. Several operational instruments, pilot projects and self-training workshops have been established. Experience has that the present system lacks the capacity to mobilise sufficient resources from Member States and to coordinate interventions as required. Member States do not make sufficient use of the existing structure and the support and coordination potential it offers. Forest fire is one of the areas targeted by research into environmental protection. The aim of this research is to understand the behavior of fire and to give decision-makers, technicians and firemen the tools to enable them to act with the necessary effectiveness and speed. Research activities have not been extended to policy arrangements against forest fires or forest management based prevention. Several pilot projects have been funded, in order to identify high-risk areas, improve detection methods and establish effective solutions to control and reduce the spreading of fires, and restore affected areas. Under the Fifth Framework Programme, the Joint Research Centre has already provided scientific and technical support for Community cooperation on Civil

Protection, including monitoring of floods and forest fires, establishment of the Community disaster information exchange system, decision-support techniques, risk assessment, prevention of technological disasters and environmental quality assessment. The Joint Research Centre can also provide technical support in relation to natural and technological disasters, including risk assessment and preventive measures. Towards the establishment of an EU – Mediterranean Environmental Policy Integration, the text of the Barcelona Declaration includes the need for assessing forest fires among the environmental problems in the Mediterranean region. It also refers to the need for proposals to establish and subsequently update short and medium-term priority environmental action programmes coordinated by the European Commission and supplemented by long-term actions with respect to forest fire prevention and control. Transfer of Community experience in financing techniques, legislation and environmental monitoring is suggested as well. The implementation of the above guidelines would be performed through measures, such as the Short and Medium-term priority Action Programme (SMAP), including Mediterranean forest protection, in particular the prevention and control of erosion, soil degradation, forest fires and combating desertification. SMAP was intended to promote the transfer of Community experience in the field of financing techniques, legislation and environmental monitoring and integration of environmental concerns in all policies. However, the financing of the Programme is still not satisfactory, and the impact of the SMAP remains uncertain. It needs to compete with other objectives, for which politicians and business may lobby harder, as they offer more direct, short-term advantages for them. United Nations Several UN agencies and programs during the last decade became actively involved in regional and global fire issues. The most important are:

• United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) • Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) • United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) • World Meteorological Organization (WMO) • World Health Organization (WHO) • International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (ISDR) / International Decade

for Natural Disaster Reduction (IDNDR) UNESCO has a certain experience in rehabilitation as well as in prevention of forest fires, from both a technical and operational angle. The projects developed are of global nature and only a limited number refers to Mediterranean countries. UNESCO organized the 1st International Scientific Conference on "Fires in Mediterranean Forests: Prevention – Suppression – Soil Erosion – Reforestation" in Athens, Greece, in February 1999. There was much discussion on the deeper socio – economic causes of forest fires in the region. The conclusions of the conference included the recognition of the wrong emphasis given only on the suppression of fires and the acquisition of the means to achieve it. The need for a shift towards an integrated management of the presence of fire in Mediterranean forest ecosystems, instead of

continually concentrating on the partial concepts of forest fire prevention and suppression, was emphasized. It also became evident that cooperation in the Mediterranean countries should be reinforced, so that scientific suggestions will be seriously taken into consideration and will be incorporated in future political decisions on the forest fire problem in Mediterranean countries. No practical measures by the individual countries have followed these conclusions. As part of its forestry program, for more than 50 years FAO has provided information and technical assistance in the area of forest fire management. FAO also collects and analyses data, produces information, guidelines and reports on forest fires, and provides direct advice to member countries. Most Mediterranean countries are represented in these databases. However, there are major doubts on the accuracy of FAO data, since forest plantations are counted as forest too and deforestation rates and forest cover data does not represent the reality. Nevertheless, FAO assessments show that, while tropical forests were disappearing at a rate of 0.8 percent per year, the forests in the southern and eastern Mediterranean Basin were vanishing at a rate of 1.2 percent per year. In March 1999, FAO organised in Rome the Expert Meeting on Public Policies Affecting Forest Fires, a milestone for combating forest fires around the world. It was the first official attempt by an international organization to clearly include policy aspects connected to the underlying causes of the phenomenon. The "Rome Declaration on Forestry", released the same period, addressed – among other things - the need for a global action to address forest fires. The declaration calls on FAO and other international organizations, donor agencies and interested countries to work together to address the underlying causes of forest fires, to improve the coordination of their efforts to prevent and combat forest fires and to rehabilitate affected areas with a view to providing assistance requested by governments, especially in anticipation of the next El Niño/La Niña events. No practical measures have followed. The Joint FAO/ECE/ILO Committee on Forest Technology, Management and Training was formed in order to undertake forest fire activities through the promotion of scientific methods in forest fire management and forest fire policy, the provision of guidance to member states on forest fire management and forest fire policies, the organization and preparation of seminars, workshops and educational programs and the promotion of the continuous exchange of information and experience among country forest fire specialists from the policy, managerial and research spheres; cooperation and coordination of activities with other international organizations dealing with forest fire questions in the region (FAO, Silva Mediterranea, IUFRO, the European Union and others). The team has close links with international organizations and programmes (IDNDR, ITTO, FAO, WMO, WHO, UNEP), mostly on organizing meetings, disseminating informational exchanging knowledge and expertise. In June 1998 the Global Fire Monitoring Center (GFMC) was established as a joint activity of the Fire Ecology Research Group of the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry, under the Freiburg University and the team of specialists on forest fire. The GFMC monitors, forecasts and archives information on vegetation fires (forest

fires, land-use fires, smoke pollution) at global level. With this information decision makers at national and international levels are supported in evaluating fire situations or precursors of fire, which potentially endanger humans or may negatively affect the environment. GFMC is the only source of data related to the issue of forest fires and the response of individual Mediterranean countries. The International Union of Forest Research Organizations (IUFRO) has included forest fires in many of its activities (meetings, seminars, conferences, internet databases), but the focus is clearly given to other ecoregions than the Mediterranean. Forestry cooperation in the Mediterranean Various Mediterranean countries have established cooperative relationships to address specific forestry issues in the region (France and the countries of the Maghreb; Lebanon, the Syrian Arab Republic and Bulgaria; Italy, Albania and Tunisia; Spain and Morocco; Germany and Turkey; and the United Kingdom and Jordan, Malta and Cyprus). In 1922, the Sylva Méditerranea, Mediterranean Forest League was established, with the participation of scientists and officers of forest services from many countries around the Mediterranean. In 1985 Silva Mediterranea, reorganized as the FAO Committee for Mediterranean Forestry Questions, resumed intensive activity. In the 1980s, a Mediterranean Forest Action Plan (MED-FAP) was elaborated and officially adopted in order to highlight and enhance forestry planning in the different Mediterranean countries. Silva Mediterranea is the only international forum dedicated to Mediterranean forest issues. It deals mainly with policy issues, research and networking for a number of forestry issues, including forest fires. FAO's Mediterranean Development Project, launched in 1959 as a result of a Silva Mediterranea recommendation (Nice, 1956), was the first concrete manifestation of the need for coordinated, integrated and lasting action in forestry development. Under the aegis of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), seven southern European countries established the International Centre for Advanced Mediterranean Agronomic Studies (ICAMAS) in 1962; they were subsequently joined by the coastal countries of the southern and eastern Mediterranean. Among other things, the centre's institute in Chania – Crete (MAICH), founded in 1983, develops cooperative research and advanced training activities in integrated rural development as well as Mediterranean forestry. MAICH has organised several short courses, meetings and seminars on forest fires for scientists, NGO representatives and firefighters. Approved at the 1992 meeting of the Silva Mediterranea Committee, MED-FAP constitutes a conceptual framework for facilitating the review of forestry planning and policy, and also for harmonizing and strengthening international cooperation in the conservation and development of Mediterranean forests. Forest fire measures are included. However, the responsibility to have the forestry plans drawn up and applied at the appropriate administrative levels is up to each country, in accordance with its constitution and legislation.

1.6 National and International funding on forest fires The value of forest fire prevention over suppression and damage restoration is broadly appreciated and mentioned in various policy papers and strategies (i.e. the 1992 Interministerial Seminar on Forest Fires in Lisbon). However, when the balance of expenses in different countries is analyzed, it becomes clear that the majority of funds are allocated for the purchase of aerial means for fighting fires. National data on prevention and suppression of forest fires is often missing or – if existing – contradicting. The reasons for this situation are:

• information is spread into different budgets of local and national bodies who are responsible for forest fires,

• funds may be allocated from different sources, • different sides give different meanings to prevention; most Mediterranean

countries consider water tanks, watching towers, road construction and weather forecasting as prevention measures, while those should be actually classified under “pre-suppression”. Prevention measures should include forest management plans and activities, awareness, research on causes of fires, etc. (ALEXANDRIAN 1999).

The general cost of fire fighting and safety devices is estimated at 1 billion US dollars annually for the Mediterranean region. Yet, the damages increase rapidly, especially in the European part of the region. In Greece, the only accurate data showing in a systematic manner the funds spent in suppression and prevention of forest fires concern the period 1981-1993. The balance between suppression/protection is 55/45 % of the total amount of money spent for fire fighting (ALBANIS et al 2000). However, the real ratio between the two categories is thought to be much different, since the evaluation of suppression expenses did not include the salaries of the permanent and seasonal personnel, flight expenses of the airplanes and the expenses of equipment belonging to other services than the Forest Service. Furthermore, during the last three years, Greece has purchased a very significant amount of aerial means and owns today the third largest fleet worldwide, after USA and Canada. Taking all this into account and considering that the activities described as prevention are actually pre-suppression, we can safely say that the difference between suppression and prevention expenses is very large indeed in favor of the former. During the years 1996 and 1997, when the Forest Service was responsible for fire protection, the funds spent for this purpose reached 36 million Euro per year, 20% of which (7.2 mil. EURO) only for prevention (actually pre-suppression) and the rest (28.8 mil. EURO) for suppression. After 1998, when the Fire Brigade took over fire suppression in Greece, the funds spent on suppression increased dramatically, reaching 73 ΜEuro (National Budget of Greece 2000). Since the prevention budget remained constant, the ratio has been changed in 9% for prevention and 91% for suppression, without taking into account the purchase of new airplanes and helicopters (Figure 11: Fire fighting expenses in Greece).

In Spain, data for the funds spent for forest protection is better (R. VELEZ, personal communication). The total budget for forest protection against fires is 360,000,000 Euro with 60% of it going to suppression and the 40% to prevention. It has been estimated that for an area of 25,000,000 ha (brushlands and grasslands included) an average of 15 EURO/ha is needed, but even there the recent decline of the national budget makes more difficult the maintenance of suppression resources at that level. Restoration expenses are not included. Public awareness for the catastrophic consequences of forest fires is generally very insufficient. In Spain, during the last two years, efforts have been made towards public awareness raising, with some positive results. The effort includes: a) the training of shepherds by specialized forest personnel for the use of prescribed burning and b) special contracts between the shepherds and the Forest Service also for prescribed burning. Lack of knowledge as well as psychological reasons, make the use of prescribed burning limited. Prescribed burning is the most effective and cheap method for the management of accumulated forest biomass. The method faces big difficulties even for research purposes. In Spain, an experiment in 1977 had to be carried out only on private land (in Greece research groups were obliged to give up their experiments). In Spain, 5000 ha/year are managed with this method when at the same time in N. America the respective area is 2,000,000 ha annually. In Portugal as well as in France the method is used regularly. In most countries restoration cost is not included in the total cost, and if at all included it is very low. In Greece reforestation after fire is restricted to 4.000 ha/year, while burned areas usually reach 100,000 ha annually. In Greece, restoration expenses concern the artificial reforestation, which also declined during the last years. This category includes the expenses for the protection against erosion. The use of burned logs parallel to the contours in order to stabilize the slope is very common, especially after large-scale wildfires. It also serves the purpose to retain the soil and seeds and to support natural regeneration. In general the restoration cost is not included in the forest fires budget of most countries, either because it is not necessary since the ecological situation is

Fire fighting expenses in Greece for 1997 and 2000

0%

50%

100%

1997 2000

preventionsuppression

appropriate for natural regeneration (big intervals between 2 fires - Spain), or because the cost is very high and the results doubtful due to ecosystem degradation from the short intervals between fires. European Union funds The level of European Union funding for forest fire prevention, suppression and restoration has been limited and is considered inadequate (VELEZ, personal communication). Moreover, fluctuations in the amount of money that is spent mostly in periods of urgency (big forest fires), leaving a very low budget for the period after the fires, causes problems of continuity in actions undertaken for the anticipation of the root causes of forest fires. The amount of EU funding for the period 1992-1996 has been Euro 70 million, which is far from adequate for the needs of the affected countries. Spain for instance receives currently an aid of less than Euro 2 million annually, with an annual total national budget of Euro 360 million. Following the Regulation 2158/92 the Community, in order to improve protection of forests against fire, allows it to make financial contribution to action of the following types:

• Identification of causes of fires and means of combating them • Creation/improvement of preventive systems • Creation/improvement of monitoring systems • Training of highly specialised personnel • Analytical studies, pilot and demonstration projects for new techniques and

technologies Programs that started during 2000 and will last for three years, apply for Germany, Greece, France, Italy, Spain, and Portugal (DG Agriculture). Each member state presents its protection improvement program and the Commission grants the most deserving for a financial contribution from the funds available. The total cost, the aid proposed and the financial breakdown by measure and country are presented below: Table 4. National programs for protection against forest fires Source: DG Agriculture Country Total cost

EUR Aid proposed

Identification of causes of fires (% of the aid proposed)

Improvement of prevention systems

Monitoring systems

Personnel training

Studies

Greece 3.350.000 1.67.5000 97% 3% Spain 3.351.147 1.675.573 62% 27% 8% 1% 2% France 3.411.918 1.672.411 8% 63% 26% 1% 2% Italy 3.683.778 1.675.000 0,5% 14,7% 52,9% 29,6% 2,3% Portugal 3.350.004 1.675.002 5,1% 36,3% 41,2% 1,3% 16,1%

As can be seen from the above table, all five countries propose an aid of nearly 50% of the total cost of the project for Community funding.

Greece allocates most of the aid proposed (97%) for the creation and improvement of the existing prevention systems i.e. maintenance of forest roads, paths and water points, fire breaks as well as forestry operations. The rest of the money is allocated to the improvement of monitoring in periods of high risk. No money is allocated to the identification of forest fire causes and to the means for combating them, or to personnel training or any form of studies. As far as research for forest fires is concerned, no money is available for Greece as well as for most of the South European countries, since forest fire research makes part of the budget allocated to the anticipation of natural disasters in general (including floods etc) and with North European countries gaining in negotiation power, allow for little or nothing at all for the South European countries (BALABANIS, DG Research, personal communication).

Spain has a more balanced financial breakdown, with most of the aid proposed (62%), allocated to the implementation of information campaigns in rural and urban areas. The creation and maintenance of forest roads, paths and water points, fire breaks and forestry operations absorbs 27%, monitoring 8%, training activities 1% and studies 2%. France allocates most of the aid proposed to protection equipment and forestry operations (63%), whereas at the same time a comparatively high percentage is allocated to monitoring (26%). Actions against the causes of forest fires represent 8% of the aid proposed, while training and studies count for 1% and 2% respectively. Italy allocates more than half of the aid proposed (52,9%), for the improvement of monitoring (acquisition of surveillance vehicles, monitoring equipment) and a high percentage (29,6%) for training activities, with the remaining 14,7% for prevention, 2,3% for studies and 0,5% for information campaigns.

Portugal, in comparison to the rest of EU countries allocates a high budget (16,1% of the aid proposed) for analytical studies, in particular burned areas mapping, study of the combustibility hazard, automatic surveillance. A percentage of 41,2% goes for the improvement of monitoring, 36,3% for prevention measures, 5,1% for actions against the causes of fire and finally 1,3% for staff training. Non-EU countries receive international money for forestry in general, from sources such as the EU, UNESCO, aid agencies, such as GTZ, the World Bank, etc. Data on budgets and expenses refer in general to forestry projects and it is impossible to describe the money spent for forest fires and to distinguish them in prevention, suppression and restoration. A better quality of data is needed, in order to evaluate the policy that lies behind the expenses and its effectiveness. From the analysis on the expenses on prevention, suppression and restoration both at national and international level the following conclusions can be drawn: • Although the importance of prevention measures over suppression and damage

restoration has been well recognized, the reality shows that the majority of funds both at national and international level are allocated to suppression and restoration measures.

• National data on funds allocated to prevention and suppression is limited, contradicting and scattered into different local and national budgets.

• Restoration costs are not included in the forest fire budget for most of the countries, while where they are included they constitute a very low proportion of the total forest fire budget.

• European Union funding on forest fire prevention, suppression and restoration has been insufficient.

• Public awareness on forest fire impacts remains at a very low level in most Euro-Mediterranean countries, with Spain being the exception where some effort has been applied.

• The lack of a single way to understand the terms suppression, pre-suppression and prevention among different parties causes misunderstandings, lack of comparability between data and inability of evaluating the existing policies and planning the future ones.

2. Root causes of forest fires in the Mediterranean In the conclusions of the previous chapter it is observed that the problem of forest fires is getting worse in all Mediterranean countries, despite the increased effort by the different governments and agencies. A number of problems that make prevention, pre-suppression, suppression and recovery difficult have been described. In this chapter, the political, social, institutional and economic issues that are connected with these problems and affect forest fire protection are identified, in order to have a clear picture of the root causes of the phenomenon in the Mediterranean region. At first, the socioeconomic situation in the Mediterranean and the sectoral policies of the region are presented and their connection with forest fires is described. 2.1 Socioeconomic features related to forest fires For the 13 countries of the project, the socio-economic as well as the geographical profile was analysed, in order to examine the possible interrelations of forest fires and socioeconomic trends. The detailed presentation of each county’s profile is included in Appendix II. Table 2: Rural Population of Mediterranean countries 1960-2010(1000) Source FAO 1990-1999

Country 1960 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010 Morocco 8217 9077 10024 10779 11413 11986 12389 12503 12666 12701 12606 Algeria 7512 7437 8316 9558 10613 11484 12036 12438 12820 13129 13330 Tunisia 2801 2801 2844 2843 3125 3385 3430 3403 3305 3214 3139 Albania 1118 1286 1459 1630 1768 1932 2113 1994 1895 1878 1862 Lebanon 1122 1087 1003 913 702 549 404 377 337 309 293 Turkey 19327 20524 21750 23374 24983 23938 21774 18846 16427 14532 13213 Cyprus 369 360 364 345 330 332 331 342 340 332 320 Croatia 1987 1891 1784 1669 France 17183 16020 14711 14218 14383 14537 14733 14698 14436 13971 13338 Italy 20401 19884 19229 19047 18826 18833 18973 19136 18911 18271 17250 Spain 13227 12412 11472 10831 10216 9921 9688 9316 8868 8355 7793 Portugal 6879 6945 6700 6578 6890 6793 6566 6349 6123 5843 5518 Greece 4755 4487 4176 4044 4076 4128 4206 4275 4248 4112 3898

As can be seen from the above table, most of the European countries present a decrease in the absolute number of their rural population between the years 1960-2000 and the trend seems to continue future projections. Almost the opposite holds for North African countries and Albania, where rural population seems to be increasing or stable. Albania shows a decline only during the last decade, which is probably the result of the political changes and immigration in the country. Turkey shows an increase in its rural population from 1960-1980, whereas from 1980-2000, an opposite trend is showing in absolute numbers. Lebanon shows a large decrease in rural population, which might be an outcome of the wars during the studied period.

The changes of rural population in the Mediterranean countries are presented as percentages on the basis of the 1960 numbers in figure 7. The trend is obvious: the population of rural areas is increasing in the south of the Mediterranean basin, while there is a rapid decline in the EU countries. Figure 7: Rural population changes (%) in the Mediterranean countries over

1960

Rural population changes

0.000.200.400.600.801.001.201.401.601.802.00

Morocc

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Tunisia

Albania

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Cyprus

France Ita

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The data presented in table 2 and figure 7 concern absolute numbers of people, whereas if comparisons are made in the percentages over the total population most of the countries show a decrease of their rural population for the years 1960-2000 (table3). Table 3: Rural population decrease 1960-2000 (% over the total population) Source FAO 1990-1999

Country Rural Population Decrease (1960- 2000) % over total population

Lebanon 50,15 Turkey 45,60 Tunisia 29,40 Algeria 28,82 Morocco 26,00 Cyprus 21,14 Spain 21,00 Greece 17,19 Portugal 15,90 France 13,18 Albania 8,53 Italy 7,64 Croatia 1,94

Urbanization is a common characteristic of all countries in the Mediterranean. The increase of absolute numbers in the rural population of the non-EU countries is probably an effect of the general increase of population in these countries. Urbanization is a result of changes in society and economy and is expected to increase in the near future. Rural populations move to the cities because they cannot support

their needs on the countryside. Most countries of the Mediterranean region failed to achieve a balanced development and their sectoral policies have promoted urbanization. The primary production has declined over the years and new economic developments and infrastructure are based in big cities. As far as forest fires are concerned, the following effects can be described:

• Most people live away from nature and cannot understand the value of the forest for the society, since their economic prosperity is not connected with it. Forest fires and their effects reach these groups through the media as a seasonal natural catastrophe. Urban people do not understand the need for a managerial approach and since they shape national policies they promote an operational response against forest fires.

• The survival of people that remain in the rural areas turns to be more difficult and leads to overexploitation, a situation that causes deforestation and promotion of forestry and agriculture practices that cause forest fires.

• Especially in the EU countries, land is abandoned, management declines and fuel is accumulated in the forest areas, causing in many cases fires, or making fire control impossible.

• Due to the decline of populations around forests and the lack of awareness, communities participate less in management and do not help in cases where suppression of fires in needed.

• The value of land around the cities and the tourism areas increases and tensions for land conversion become large. This is a common cause of fires, especially considering that the demand is high for areas with a very dry Mediterranean climate.

• Development and especially land use policies are not efficient in most countries and cannot regulate the new population trends, leading to uncontrolled increase of houses, hotels and other buildings in forest areas.

In countries with an increasing -in absolute terms- rural population, a significant percentage of the labour force is actively involved in the agricultural sector (including forestry and livestock), which represents an important part of the countries’ GDP, as can be seen in figure 8 as well as in table 3 of Appendix I.

Figure 8: Labour force in agriculture (%) and participation of agriculture in the GDP (%) of Mediterranean countries

0

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Alba

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Labour force inagriculture (%)

Participation ofagriculture inGDP (%)

Among the 13 countries, France and Italy present the highest Gross Domestic Product, followed by Spain and Turkey. Albania with 5.6 billion $, is ranged last with the lowest GDP (Appendix 1). At the same time, the participation of Agriculture in France’s and Italy’s GDP, (5 and 7 respectively), is the lowest among the 13 countries and the same applies for their labour force working on the sector (Figure 8). Half of the Albanian population works in Agriculture, which represents 54% of its GDP. The same applies to Turkey with 45,8% of its labour force working in Agriculture, which represents 18% of its GDP. The participation of the agricultural sector (including forestry and livestock) in the national economy of most EU Mediterranean countries is declining. This is directly connected to rural abandonment and consequently to increased fuel accumulation, which leads to increasing forest fires. Furthermore, the low importance of rural areas for the national economy is a reason for the lack of political will for increased investment and appropriate management of these areas in some countries. Communities do not participate in forest management and they are unable to assist in prevention and suppression activities. In countries where rural populations depend financially from forest resources, fuel accumulation is usually kept low and when fires break out, they do not spread and damages are avoided (NE’EMAN et al.1993). While this is true for forest fires, an increased financial dependence of rural populations in agriculture and forestry leads often to negative results in forest protection. In North Africa, forest quantity and quality has decreased during the last decades, due to overexploitation and intensification of management. This has led to loss of natural forests and an increase of coppice plantations that are also more vulnerable to fire. A positive example for economic activities that prevent fires is the case of the Aleppo pine forests in Greece managed for resin: while resin had a good price in the international markets, the resin workers kept the understory low and when fires

occurred they managed to suppress them effectively. During the last two decades, the decline in the resin production and the subsequent abandonment of the area has lead to the destruction of many of those forests (PAPASTAVROU 1997). One of the main reasons for the decline of resin production was the establishment of law 998/79 that allowed resin workers to build houses inside their territory. Many workers have sold their land for housing and the most important Aleppo pine stands around Athens burned in the 80s. This is a typical case, where a wrong policy has stimulated a wrong type of development, leading to urbanization, land abandonment and forest fires. Rural abandonment, along with the expansion of the urban centers in most of the European cities of the Mediterranean, apart from the expansion of the forests and the increase in fuel accumulation, has also led to the decrease of the population depending economically on forest exploitation. That, in turn has led to the decrease of public interest for the condition and the proper management of the forests, since there is no direct profit in economic terms. Social and economic changes, during the last decades and especially the improvement of economic conditions and people’s well being in most of the Mediterranean countries, have deeply affected people’s attitudes towards forest fires. People living near forests most of the times do not participate actively in the suppression of forest fires. This behavior is partially explained by the fact that people rely mostly on the modern equipment and the possibilities of modern technology, ignoring the crucial role of human contribution in the battle against forest fires. In Greece, forest workers used to participate in suppression operations until 1997. Using their equipment and under the supervision of the forest service, they managed to remove the fuel before the fire spread widely. After 1998, the forest workers are not participating in forest suppression, since there is no organizational framework for including their teams in the fire suppression scheme. The Fire Brigade does not have any experience with fuel management and rely exclusively on high tech suppression means. WWF Greece has stimulated model cooperation scheme between the forest workers and the firemen around the Dadia forest with success, during the summer of 2000. There seems to be a general lack of awareness to the fact that a good suppression plan is primary based on well organized and suitably trained terrestrial forces equipped with simple tools (such as hoes and shovels as is North America’s model) and secondarily on air forces. That is one more reason why “prosperous” countries like Italy, France and Spain with a lot of suppression means and modern technology show increasing forest fire damages. On the contrary, the poorer North African countries, with very limited suppression means present relatively small numbers of fires and limited damages. Besides the fact that this may be due to a general deforestation in these countries, it also shows the effectiveness of the involvement of local communities in fire management. Thus, the hiring of a large number of forest firefighters suitably and thoroughly trained is very important, even if they could not be so effective without the aid of the local people who have a better knowledge of both the topography and the vegetation of an area.

The main conclusions drawn out of the analysis of the socio-economic issues in the Mediterranean, related to forest fires, are:

• There is a general trend of urbanization all over the Mediterranean basin. However, due to the general population increase in the N. African countries, the rural population of N. African countries is increasing. The economy of these countries depends mainly on the activities of the rural population.

• In the European countries, the rural population is declining rapidly and the national economies do not depend on agriculture, forestry and pasture. This internal migration has stimulated a rapid – in many cases uncontrolled - development.

• Increased incomes along with other social and economic changes in most European countries have changed the attitude of rural populations towards forest fires. People do not participate anymore in management and protection activities.

• Although the EU countries are richer and can maintain a well equipped suppression mechanism, the fires are much more damaging, due to the absence of local participation in forest fire suppression. Governments respond with more sophisticated suppression tools.

• All the above cause a shift from a managerial approach to a pure operational one. Fire is no more part of the land management systems and fuel management is poor. In the non-EU countries, overexploitation in rural areas has become more intense leading to increased fire hazard and deforestation.

• Land use planning is poor and cannot regulate the sudden demand on buildings and infrastructure near cities. Sector development does not include measures for fire management and protection.

2.2 Sectoral policies Forestry Mediterranean forests and wooded areas have a high biological, ecological, cultural and economic value. Apart from the fact that they provide a large variety of products sustaining local incomes, they also maintain complex ecological functions such as hydrologic stability and protection from soil erosion, especially in the Mediterranean region where climatic conditions favor drought. Moreover, forests in the Mediterranean, with their high aesthetic value, have always been related to local people’s cultural life, and constitute a valuable part of the national heritage of the Mediterranean countries. Traditional forestry, developed in and adapted mainly to North European countries with continental climate, has focused on the economic value of the forests and more specifically the production of timber and game, not taking into account the particular character of the Mediterranean forests. This attitude has influenced the management policies, strategies and priorities in the Mediterranean countries. The classification of the terrestrial ecosystems in “forests” and “other wooded areas” is an example of this attitude. Even today that forestry recognizes a “multi-purpose” aspect of forests and forestry, a lot of continental structures still remain in the Mediterranean countries (FAO 1999b).

The result of this approach is that in many Mediterranean countries “other wooded areas” that constitute the majority of terrestrial ecosystems, and which are considered as degraded forests are not fully appreciated as important ecosystems by the state. Those important areas which usually cover dry lands maintaining the vegetation and protecting the soil and water do not make part of any forest strategy and constitute a vague category, between forest and other land uses, such as agriculture. Management of those areas is mostly done traditionally and not systematically and naturally they are the first to suffer from land use conflicts leading to forest fires. Another result of this attitude is that forest fires are considered to their entirety a natural disaster and no discretion is made to take into account the presence of fire as a part of the succession of the Mediterranean ecosystems. As an inherent part of the ecosystem, forest fires should be anticipated through a systematic forest management, focused mainly and promoting an adequate prevention planning. Fire is used as a management tool by farmers and shepherds in a traditional way. The decline of rural populations in the north of the Mediterranean basin has reduced this kind of management and the catastrophic fires become more and more frequent. The forest policy of the EU is part of the agricultural policy (CAP) and includes the protection of forests against atmospheric pollution and forest fires. Since 1986, the protection of forests against these threats has been a major element of the Community’s actions in the forestry sector. All Member States have taken initiatives aiming to improve their national forestry policies. They have also developed guidelines for the sustainable management of forests with the intention of integrating these guidelines into the national and regional forestry plans and programmes. The Treaty of Rome makes no provision for an official European forestry policy (Articles 3 and 43). The lack of a specific legal basis in the Treaty coincides with strong opposition from a number of Member States to a common forestry policy comparable to the common agricultural policy, particularly with regard to forest management (exploitation) and the timber market. Despite the legal and political obstacles, in recent years the Community has developed a large number of forestry activities, both internally and internationally, including measures against forest fires, that focus mainly on pre-suppression and suppression. The Forestry Action Programme, which was adopted by the Council in 1989 and was reviewed and strengthened in 1992, includes actions for protection against forest fires with a budget of 70 MEuro for the period 1992-1996. Their purpose is to identify and eliminate the causes of forest fires and to improve forest monitoring systems. This programme is oriented primarily at fire prevention, while it actually includes only measures that are rather characterized as pre-suppression. Regulation 2158/92 failed to focus on the political and socio – economic causes of forest fires, as was planned, but included measures of a rather technical nature. All regulations that followed have arranged mainly the methods that financial aid was distributed to Member Countries. The EU forest policy was reformed during the procedure of the CAP reform in 1999. Despite the fact that Agenda 2000 states the necessity of the inclusion of environmental issues in agriculture, forestry is viewed from a production point of view. The strong emphasis that forestry is part of agriculture and rural development within Agenda 2000, gives DG VI the lead in forestry. Forestry is at least as much an

environmental issue than a rural development one (and has indeed not much in common with agriculture). The strategy fails to acknowledge the relevance of EU environmental competence to forest issues. DG XI has unfortunately accepted their minor role within forestry. Forest fires seem to have the same importance as disease of agricultural plants! While the EU forest policy deals directly with forest fires, it does not contribute to the solution of the problem as it promotes an operational approach and not a management one. Furthermore, within the framework of the CAP the EU focuses more on the needs of Central and Northern European forests, promoting timber production and ignoring the incorporation of fire protection in forest management, something that is vitally important for the Mediterranean Member States. DG XII promotes research among the EU and accession states and has financed many forest research projects, supporting, implementing and evaluating the forestry policy of the EU. The scale of forest fires in Europe has forced the Commission to include this issue among the areas targeted by research into environmental protection. The aim of this research is to understand the behavior of fire and to give decision-makers, technicians, and firemen the tools to enable them to act with the necessary effectiveness and speed. Research activities have not been extended to policy arrangements against forest fires or forest management based prevention. The EU forest policy has in general a negative effect for the forest fires in South Europe, since it promotes suppression and pre-suppression measures without developing forest fire management in the region. This approach has brought no results so far and the EU should reconsider its policy. Experience shows that modern technologies in pre-suppression and suppression can be only effective when they are combined with fire prevention measures, as part of a multi-purpose forest management. Summing up the main disadvantages of the EU forestry policy on forest fires are:

• The aim of reducing forest fires is part of more than one EU policies (mainly as part of the forestry action program, the policy on civil protection, the research program framework and the Euro-Mediterranean convention), without the proper links among them.

• Despite the recognition of socio–economic and policy factors as deeper causes for forest fires in the southern part of Europe, no relevant measures have yet been taken. Most measures focus on Union defined prevention (provision of forest paths, firebreaks, water supply points, clearing equipment and monitoring facilities), networking, suppression and exchange of knowledge.

• Research programs focus on ways of detecting monitoring and fighting forest fires and are not dealing with social and policy studies for the effectiveness of certain EU policies and their impact on the appearance and intensity of forest fires.

• Despite a significant level of activity, the Community has never had a genuine, consistent and clearly defined forestry policy. This affects forest fires as well.

• Forest fires have never been a priority within the EU forest policy, which focuses more on timber production, since it is influenced strongly by the Northern member states with a significant timber industry.

• The level of European Union funding has been seriously inadequate (ECU 70 million for the period 1992- 1996) in view of the large number of applications every year from the Member States.

Civil protection All Mediterranean countries have policies and plans to react to disasters, in order to protect the civil population. Earthquakes, extreme meteorological phenomena and technological failures are such disasters. Many countries of the region consider forest fires a natural disaster and include it in their policy. While this may have positive effects, it can contribute to the lack of a managerial approach, when this policy is the main tool for reacting against forest fires. Portugal (VIEGAS 1991), Greece (XANTHOPOULOS 2000), Italy (CALABRI 1990) and Lebanon (BASSIL 2000) have a central civil protection agency playing a major role in planning and coordinating forest fire management. The EU policy on civil protection includes combating – among other catastrophes – forest fires and its approach is a purely operational one, aimed at the quickest and most efficient mobilization of member states to help after a disaster occurs, inside or outside the European Union. Agricultural policy Agricultural Policy is one of the two key sectors of intervention of the European Union (the other being the Structural Funds). It is very important both in economic terms, in that it absorbs a large part of the EU budget, if the guidance and intervention sectors are taken into account. This very significant flow of funds is channeled through a complicated mechanism to farmers and producers. It is such an important intervention that it can be safely said that the picture of agriculture in the EU was drawn in the last 40 years on the canvas set by this policy. Besides the immediate financial importance of this policy, there are many secondary effects on the social web and the productive / employment structures in the European countryside, very closely related to the effects on nature conservation and hence, forest policy. At the same time, the EU being one of the most important agricultural buyers and sellers in the international market has influenced the global picture of agricultural development, and most importantly through its effects on the neighboring Mediterranean countries, also directly affected by specific policies of the EU directed to those countries. As a result, agricultural development has been affected in two ways in the Mediterranean countries:

• abandonment of traditional products and productive methods after being rendered uncompetitive vis-à-vis the heavily subsidized EU products;

• establishment of specialized intensive production of goods favored by agreements with the EU and often a comparative (mostly climatic) advantage – cotton is an example.

This influence of the EU agricultural policy has produced a series of effects related to forest management and forest fires. One of the most important is that by setting the conditions for intensification of production within and outside the EU in the Mediterranean region, it has created a secondary pressure for land reclamation from forested land and wetlands. However, the result was not the same in the EU and non-EU Mediterranean counties. In the EU, the intensification was mainly concentrated on capital (machinery) and the use of the most productive lands or those fit for the use of heavy machinery, guiding the land reclamation pressure more towards wetlands rather than marginal forest areas with high slopes. At the same time it decreased drastically the labour intensity of the agricultural sector. This has in turn led to the abandonment of the countryside and the influx of European to urban agglomerations. In the non-EU Mediterranean countries the effect was quite the contrary: Intensification was labour intensive, due to its lower cost, as well as land intensive leading to the expansion towards both productive and marginal lands. The expansion of olive orchards in every conceivable way (an example also found in a number of EU countries – notably Spain and Greece) clearly demonstrates the case. In the case of non-EU countries though, the intensification of agriculture being labour intensive has maintained the presence of rural populations in the countryside, with secondary effects on forests. Among them one could emphasise that besides the actual reduction of forest cover as a result of agricultural expansion, the quality of the remaining forest cover also decreased, because of its use for fuel and other resources. Often the collection of fuel comes in an organized manner, therefore leading to the substitution of old growth forests from relatively intensively used coppice forest. Another effect however is the presence of local people in the cases of forest fires, where their role can be estimated to be positive. By having a good knowledge of their region and because the intervention of local people can be practically immediate during the first stages of forest fires, suppression appears quite good when compared to the high-tech suppression means that the non-EU Mediterranean countries have. A part of the overall agricultural policy of the EU is the forest policy. Although a clearly defined policy per se has never been spelled out in this context, a number of interventions have been carried out as regards forests for the EU countries. However, most of these interventions have been single sided, and not necessarily in the right direction for the sustainable development and protection of high quality forest cover. Among these interventions one could discern the subsidies for the development of forest plantations, which besides leading to a (limited) conversion of mostly marginal agricultural lands into coppice forest, has prevalently led to the wide scale substitution of old growth forest by commercial plantations (especially in Portugal and Spain). In the same way, the investments effected by this policy field for facing the problem of forest fires was again single sided and directed almost exclusively to fire suppression mechanisms (including machinery, payments for the opening of forest roads to allow the easier access of fire fighting units – a policy highly debated as the problems it creates may be much higher than the benefits-, and the support for the construction of water storage facilities in forest areas). Also, a significant part of

assistance was provided to the development and use of early warning forest fire systems, with limited success to date. The forest fire policy clearly fails to address the socio-economic issues created by the EU agricultural (including forest management) policy itself. It is not taking into account, let alone counteracting or resolving, the problems created by intensification and the abandonment of the countryside, and focuses on the least cost effective means of forest fire suppression. In conclusion one could say that the EU agricultural policy has had mostly a negative impact on forest management and forest fires both in the EU and non-EU Mediterranean countries. Besides an increase in absolute forest cover in the EU countries, the intensification of agriculture and the incentives given for exploitation of forests have led to the decrease of forest quality. In this context, and because the non-commercial or monetary values of forest have not been taken into account in the formulation of this policy (including aesthetic, biodiversity and ecosystems function parameters), the agricultural and forest support schemes of the EU clearly failed to protect these values and worked in most cases against them. Tourism and tourist infrastructure development Tourism is one of the most important sectors of the economy in Europe, and especially so in the Mediterranean region which constitutes the prime destination for all visitors. It is estimated that tourism directly employs 9 million people in the European Union, representing 6% of total employment and accounting for at least 5.5% of GDP and 30% of total external trade in services. There is no evidence to demonstrate that there is a direct linkage between tourism and forest fires in the region. However, a set of secondary effects and reasons leads to the conclusion that tourist development in the Mediterranean plays a part in reinforcing the effects of other causes as regards the forest fires problem. Most prominent between them stands the issue of inadequate planning for the development of tourism plans and facilities. The effects of tourism development on land use planning and of the actual location of facilities, including hotels, campings, and recreational activities, increases the pressure on the intensive land use, with a consecutive important increase in land values. Especially when this happens in countries with limited land planning and enforcement (which is the case in many Mediterranean counties, both within and outside the EU – Tunisia, Cyprus, Greece are a few examples) the effects can be quite significant. In addition, the limited capacity in controlling the massive influx of visitors, especially when their activities include uncontrolled and potentially dangerous activities, including free camping, campfires and uncontrolled disposal of waste, constitutes a high risk factor for the ignition of wildfires. The issue of appropriate planning for the location of tourism facilities is further aggravated by the lack of the necessary mechanisms and infrastructure for the control of the risk of forest fires. This includes all levels, starting from the need for increased

awareness of the visitors for the prevention of fires ignition, and the means and coordination for the early warning and suppression. Both the need to establish a well-prepared mechanism for the prevention and suppression of fires, as well as the negative impacts that forest fires in turn have on tourism have been felt in may areas of the Mediterranean. The cases of important forest fires during the peak periods in areas of high tourist development (including Southern France, Greece and Turkey) have seen a lot of publicity during the last few years. On the other hand, forest fires resulted in massive cancellations for areas that were significantly hit. A characteristic example was the island of Samos, Greece, where after the devastating fires of August 2000, more than 50% of all bookings for 2001 were cancelled. In conclusion, and although there is no direct relationship between tourism and forest fires, it is clear that inadequate planning, lack of control on activities, and the absence of a clear policy and action for the prevention and early suppression of fires in tourist areas constitutes a significant component in the forest fires picture in the Mediterranean. Urban development The development of urban agglomerations, including both housing and manufacturing facilities, is considered as one of the most important factors in relation to forest fires in the Mediterranean region. Although the problem seems to be important in all the countries around the Mediterranean basin, the relative intensity is not quite homogenous. The most important reason for forest fires in areas close to urban centres is the pressure for land use changes. In those countries where land use is not properly legislated, planned and enforced, a significant increase in the land demand for urban development leads to a sharp increase in land values. When a legislative background that does not clearly impede the land use change from forest to urban uses accompanies this phenomenon, the result is uncontrolled expansion of urban uses in forest areas. This case is usually based on the illegal clearance of forest area, which is done in mostly by burning. There are many examples of arson that has taken place, often on a carefully planned basis, as was the case in Pendeli, Greece, made obvious by the many simultaneous ignition points, which ruled out the possibility of accidental fire outbreak. The burning of forest areas close to urban centers for their further expansion, besides having a serious impact on the reduction of forest cover as an absolute surface, has other serious implications. Reduced rainwater retention of the areas surrounding the cities leading to floods, and change of climatic characteristics in the broader area, allowing harsh phenomena both in winter and summer are two of them. Finally, the use of suburban forests as refuges or corridors for wildlife and biodiversity is seriously disrupted or eradicated, mostly because in the case of arson the extent of the

fire cannot be controlled, leading to the burning of a much larger area than the one aimed for development. Another side of the impacts of urban expansion towards suburban forests, is created by the networks and facilities established for the needs of the agglomerations. The roads, electricity and telephone networks as well as the disposal of waste constitute a high risk factor for the accidental ignition of fires, as is discussed in the following paragraphs. Although the problem of forest fires resulting from urban development is very serious, the relevant policies for confronting it are not properly developed. Besides the obvious need for the reinforcement of legislation, in order to impede the unplanned developments and subsequently eradicate the incentives for arson, it is necessary to establish full awareness and information campaign for citizens as regards the need for protection of suburban forests, the risk factors related to the change of land uses in such cases, as well as the multiple benefits of those areas for the urban centers that cannot be measured in financial terms. Transport Networks Increasing population and the expansion of cities has led to the development of transport networks with the construction of regional roads and highways, very often within the limits of sensitive natural areas. The inefficient planning of the transport system along with the lack of protection measures for the natural areas that lie close to the roads puts many valuable natural areas in great danger, including the risk of forest fires. In the case of roads built to serve urban areas that lie close to forests, the increased presence of traffic and the lack of awareness for the fire risk as a result of negligence have in many cases resulted in the accidental ignition of fires with detrimental effects. On the other hand, the building of regional or national roads close to or even through forest areas, besides of the impacts to the forest ecosystem and biodiversity, constitutes a high risk for the ignition of forest fires, especially in dry seasons with high temperatures and winds. Apart from the increased risk resulting from human negligence and technical reasons (sparks etc), the poor maintenance of the roadsides, and the accumulation of flammable material is a serious problem. There are many examples of fires that started in this way, including the catastrophic fires along the highway on north Peloponese in Greece, both in 2000 and 1998. Another issue related to transport networks construction is that conventional cost-benefit analyses tend to underestimate the environmental impacts and risks of such projects, since many of them are hard to be measured in monetary terms. Although the risk of forest fires as a result of such developments should be taken into account, it rarely is. Apart from the regional and national road networks, the complex network of forest roads that has been developed makes access to the forest easy. Although such forest

roads are claimed to be opened to facilitate forest management and fire suppression – very often built with EU financial support -, it is questionable whether the final result is positive at all as, besides the above mentioned purposes they allow easy access to those that accidentally or willingly may start a forest fire. Energy Networks There is much evidence in most Mediterranean countries that a significant number of fires have started from poorly maintained electricity networks, especially during dry and hot summers. Electricity lines that cut across dense parts of forests, where both access is very difficult and early detection of a fire is very limited, constitute a major risk for fire ignition. The dispersion of responsibility among different stakeholders is a central issue in this case. Because the maintenance of lines is the responsibility of the electricity companies, while the clearance of the forest around them and the removal of accumulated biomass may be divided between the local authorities and the forest authorities, it is practically impossible to account the liability of any one body in such a case. Examples of fires resulting from energy networks are common. In Greece there have been incidents of forest fires that started from electricity cables in Pendeli mountain near Athens (1995) Kalamata in Peloponese and Ierapetra in Crete (1998). Although the first ruling and the responsibility for remuneration to those affected by the fire was against the Public Power Corporation, this one put the blame on the local authorities and the case is still in court. Waste dumps Illegal waste dumping is another common cause of forest fires. In the cases where waste is not properly managed and disposed of in adequately planned and monitored landfills, the haphazard dumping in forest areas often results in fires breaking out. The accumulation of biomass and as a result the production of flammable gases, and the presence of dangerous materials including metals and glass often lead to combustion and start a forest fire. 2.3 Structural and strategic causes related to forest fires Based on the description of the current situation and the analysis of the socioeconomic situation and the sectoral policies in the Mediterranean region, this chapter aims at presenting the root causes of forest fires in the Mediterranean region in a systematic approach. The root causes are categorized in three main groups according to their relation with international cooperation, fire management and development policies.

International cooperation

The problem of forest fires is too large to be controlled at a single government level. It is a Mediterranean problem, but most international associations include forest fires as a small part of their activities, as a geographical or thematic subunit. There is a lack of a common perception of forest fires in the Mediterranean.

Data availability is a major problem in the countries of the region. Even where it is available, it is not comparable, due to different methodologies, definitions, perception and mentalities. In some countries this happens even between different years (e.g. Greece). The differences in the forest fire data are mostly due to differences in forestry data and definitions in general. Some countries name all non-urban fires “forest fires”, others consider plantations as forest land. FAO, UNESCO and the EU have recognised the need for a common database on forest fires, but have again to rely on the same problematic national data. The most common measures used to describe forest fires are obviously not sufficient to provide a useful set of information. Number of fires and burned forest area too sensitive on the method and comparisons between countries, or even between regions of the countries are almost impossible. The information they provide is also not enough by itself, since these measures are influenced by complex reasons (climatic fluctuations, terrain, effectiveness of means, stochastic effects, social and economic tendencies, methodology, etc.) and they do not lead to safe and useful conclusions about the factors that cause them. The causal analysis of forest fires is problematic. In many countries there are too many unknown fires, due to lack of investigation after the fire, or political and social reasons. In Portugal, after the investigation method has changed, the percentage of unknown fires decreased rapidly. Another phenomenon observed is an intense discussion on arsons, especially in countries where the state tries to cover its own ineffectiveness in firefighting. As a result of these problems, no comparison between the countries and no analysis of the problem is possible. Lack of data on forest fires and their causes are a major obstacle in understanding the nature of forest fires and design strategies and measures in national and international level. International agencies often receive wrong messages and respond in a wrong way. Information is needed to describe the magnitude and urgency of the problem to decision makers and to make them prioritize the necessary measures. Differences in definitions concerning forest fires is a major obstacle for the realisation of any international strategy on the ground. The EU and many countries consider measures such as fire break maintenance, road construction and patrolling as prevention, while it is actually pre-suppression. This causes a wrong balance in the money spent on prevention as opposed to suppression and presents a biased picture in the decision makers. Fire management measures incorporated within forest management are in general not promoted, because they are not even considered. The EU policies related directly or indirectly to forest fires are not fit to address the issue in the Mediterranean, also because they are strongly influenced by the timber-producing northern countries of the continent. As a result, forest fire management

becomes often a low priority and receives little attention and financial assistance. An effective Mediterranean forest fire initiative does not exist in any international organization, besides some meetings and research projects without any application. The Mediterranean has its own specific characteristics that define the way forest fires should be controlled and cannot be a simple sub-unit of a larger international policy. Forest fire management Local community involvement. A major element that comes up from the analysis is that local communities become less involved in forest fire management over the years, in all countries. In the EU countries, the communities no longer depend financially on the forest and its value is decreasing in comparison to other uses, such as tourism. The lack of local involvement in forest management has caused fuel accumulation, making forest fires uncontrollable when they are not suppressed at their start. In the non-EU countries, the forest has lost value in comparison to other land uses, but people still depend on land uses for primary production. This has lead to overexploitation, and degradation of forest quality and quantity. The burned areas are less than in the EU countries, but deforestation occurs through other means of land use and practices. Forest fire management has changed dramatically, due to the lack of the involvement of local communities. There is a clear trend to move away from low (regional and local level) management approach, in which fire protection measures are part of forest management, towards a high-profile operational model, in which high tech equipment and professional specialized units are involved after the fire brakes out. In the latter case, suppression and prevention are assigned to different players. Coordination is too often very poor. Local populations have a low level of awareness concerning their attitude to forest fire protection. They often burn forests by mistake, using fire as a tool in the wrong time and at the wrong place. People also burn forests on purpose in order to replace it with other land uses that may bring short-term profit. This indicates that people are not aware of the long-term value of forests and the services they provide. They cannot connect the forest with their own quality of life. A major factor that contributes to the lack of awareness is the inability of the Mediterranean countries to estimate and describe the impacts of forest fires on the society and the people. Government policies seem to be unable to control forest fires. They do not manage to establish and apply simple management regulations for agriculture and pasture (such as season of burning, method), in order to stop accidental fires. In countries where a central forestry body is responsible for the whole range of forest activities (mainly North Africa and Turkey), the state often fails to control and coordinate all prevention and suppression measures planned. During years of extreme drought and many fires per day, the state mechanism is unable to respond successfully to all cases and the local populations are not part of the firefighting mechanism. In cases where the mixed system is applied, coordination before and during the fire is a major problem. More

important, different actors perform different tasks, following usually different mentalities and implement different policies. Governments also fail to recognise and report the problems raised. Almost all official reports present a very flattering picture about the organisation of fire management of the countries, while the numbers show that the problem becomes worse. This is a result of the wrong understanding governments have on the issue of forest fires: through a pure operational approach, they fail to recognise the nature of the phenomenon and consider the accumulation of aerial suppression means equivalent to the expected success of the mechanism. As shown in practice this perception is wrong. Development policies The development process that took place during the last decades – and still goes on – was not well planned and caused many problems in almost all Mediterranean countries, with forest fires as one of the results. Sectoral policies (if existing) were not able to predict the trends in land use planning and to include aspects such as fire hazard. Governments failed to control industry, military, dump and transportation networks that cause very often fires due to bad maintenance of their facilities. The pressure for land use change on forests is in most countries high. Many governments have failed to protect the forest (burned or not) from these pressures and could not stop land conversion and reduction of forest quantity and quality. Forest legislation has in many cases contradicting regulations giving the possibility for land use change after fire. Some Mediterranean countries (Greece, Turkey) do not have clear legislation on land ownership and uses. This fact, combined with the high political cost for governments to resolve the tenure problem, acts promising for land grabbers and other opportunists for succeeding a land use change of the burned forest.

Case study: Root causes of forest fires in Greece In Greece, land tenure and land use are complex and the state has not so far given an effective solution to this problem (WWF GREECE 1999a). The land cadastre that was to be prepared with the support of EU Structural Funds may be facing a funding suspension by the European Commission. The movement of a large number of the population to the big urban centers and to the tourist coastal areas, has resulted in increased land values. The problematic state’s housing policy, urban planning and legislation, has encouraged arsonists and land grabbers to continue their action (WWF GREECE 1999c). Additionally, there is room for suspicion regarding corruption, especially if the low salaries and high interests are taken into account (WWF GREECE 1999b). The sudden and badly planned development in Greece has stimulated more forest fires since:

arsons were encouraged from the high prices of the land and the ineffective causal analysis of fires,

land grabbing was not always punished and illegal buildings were in some cases legalised after a few years for political reasons,

the development policy of the last decades has resulted in a mosaic of badly planned constructions and infrastructure inside or next to the forest, increasing the accidental fires,

forestry has declined rapidly during the last decades, causing fuel accumulation in managed forests and lack of control of illegal activities.

Greece has adapted the mixed firefighting system in 1998. The responsibility for forest fires suppression has been transferred from the Forest Service to the Fire Brigade without long term planning, preparation and cooperation between the responsible actors. The Fire Brigade has neither the experience nor the scientific knowledge to confront forest fires. The Forest Service has neither the funds nor the personnel needed to apply fire prevention. There has been no effective coordination between the authorities. This was fully revealed in the summer of the year 2000 during the catastrophic fire in the island of Samos. After the initiation of the fire a number of state officials, local authorities, army officers, firemen and others have tried to coordinate the suppression operations without any success. Participation of local foresters in the coordination meetings was limited and the knowledge of the area topography was not exploited. It is a recorded fact, that during the coordination meetings, a small tourist map of the island was used! More than 3000 firemen were transferred on the island, but coordination problems did not allow them to face up to the many fronts, rendering them ineffective. The fire finally slowed down after two weeks, when the wind stopped. Communities do no longer participate in forest fire management. Forest management is declining and the economy of the people does no longer depend on the forest. Awareness in lacking and the people do not take the necessary measures to reduce fuel and to apply safe use of fire. Furthermore, the participation of locals during suppression operations is limited, since they wait for the airplanes to come. The importance of ground forces in firefighting is unknown to the people, the firemen and the decision makers. Another important issue concerning fire fighting in Greece is the failure to distinguish between fire suppression and forest management. As a result, a large part of the

relevant budgets is allocated either in buying airplanes or in the construction of a road network on the mountains in order to allow fire vehicles to have instant access in remote places. As a result, Greece- after USA and Canada-, owns today the third largest fleet of fire combating airplanes, and has one of the most dense road networks in the forests. Yet, large catastrophic fires are more and more frequent while every year the government announces the purchase of more airplanes (STAMOU 1998; NASTIS 1998). Forestry in Greece has steadily declined during the last 20 years. The Forest Service suffers a lack of personnel, infrastructure and funds. The management plans of the productive forests are not revised properly and many forest stations have closed. This has caused a severe decrease of warding and control and the promotion of illegal activities, such as poaching, illegal logging, bad management, poor reforestations, housing, etc (TROUMPIS 1998). It is interesting that the Secretary General for Forests at the Ministry of Agriculture resigned in April 1998 and was not replaced since, although it was only the fire fighting responsibility that was transferred to the Ministry of Public Order but not the forest management policy, which remained with the Ministry of Agriculture. A central forest fire policy is lacking in Greece. Fires are seen as sudden disasters and the focus is given in public safety and property protection. The General Secretary of Public Protection is supposed to coordinate the measures against forest fires. Their approach is an operational one. While Greece has one of the best maintained forest fire records in the Mediterranean, data accuracy is declining due to the current mixed fire management system. The two main agencies involved have different methodologies and mentalities and the results are not comparable. Furthermore, causal analysis is problematic and the percentage of unknown causes is too high. Most people think that all fires are set deliberately by arsonists and this is often the excuse of the state to explain its own failure to control the problem. As a result the State does not recognise the gaps in the system used and the people do not take measures against accidental fires. It is clear that the reduction of the large catastrophic forest fires in Greece will not be the result of a reviewed forest fire policy only, but will only be reached through a total reform of the rural development policy, focused mainly in the management of forests and forest fires rather than suppression (TROUMPIS 1998). 2.4 Conclusions From the analysis on the root causes of forest fires in the Mediterranean the following conclusions can be drawn:

• A common database on forest fires for all the Mediterranean countries is still missing. Data, when it exists, is scattered, non-homogenous and difficult to process.

• Collaboration between Mediterranean countries on forest fire issues is very limited.

• Research on forest fires is done in some countries but the results are not communicated through experts meetings and exchange of information.

• The analysis of the actual direct and indirect effects of forest fires is at a very preliminary level, failing to identify and estimate the real burden posed onto the economy and society from forest fires.

• Mediterranean countries share common characteristics concerning forest fires and their ecological and socioeconomic features. An integrated approach is needed both in forest planning and management of forest fires.

• Forests are not viewed as a common good having vital links with the local economies. Communities do not feel part of forest management.

• Public awareness on the values of forest other than direct timber production is not adequately promoted.

• There is a lack of a management approach on forest fires issues. Forest fires are treated as a natural disaster only and analysed (depending on the case) as either an effect of the development and management policies of a country or a region, or an inherent part of the Mediterranean ecosystems, and in some cases as a management tool for forests.

• Sectoral policies (agricultural policy, tourism development, urban development etc…), contribute to a non-sustainable process, which in turn increases the distortions between communities and the forests.

• Forest policy at a national or EU level is in most cases focused on production and forest fires constitute only a minor part of it, despite its importance for the forests of the region. In most countries forests and forestry are the lesser part of the broader agricultural policy.

• Fighting forest fires is in most cases seen as a reaction to a natural catastrophe, independently from the actual root causes and forest management policies and practice.

2.8 Countries forest fires root causes matrix From the analysis of the socio-economic, institutional and legal framework and its relation to the anticipation of the forest fires in the Mediterranean countries, a countries forest fires root causes matrix has been prepared, scaling the importance of each of the root causes from very to low important in order to have a better perspective of the similarities as well as the differences between the countries’ root causes of forest fires.

K

ey issue / C

ountry

Insufficient knowledge and data on forest fires

Suppression approach, lack of fire management policy

Inefficient forest management practices, timber production approach

Forestry is a weak part of agricultural policy

Land use planning / urban development

Mass tourism development pressure

Lack of community involvement in fire management

Population pressure on forests

Lack of public awareness on forest values and fires

Lack of transnational collaboration

Lack of forest and fuel management

Algeria

++

++

+++

+++

+++

+

+

+++

-

+++

+++

Tunisia

++

++

+++

+++

+++

+++

+

+++

+++

+++

+++

Morocco

++

++

+++

+++

+++

++

+

+++

-

+++

++

Lebanon

+++

+++

+++

+++

+++

+

+++

++

+++

+++

+++

Turkey

++

++

+++

++

+++

+++

++

+++

+++

++

++

Cyprus

+++

++

+++

++

+

+++

+++

+

++

++

++

Croatia

+++

++

-

-

++

++

-

-

-

-

- Spain

+

++

++

+++

+

+++

+++

+

+

+

+

France

+

++

++

+++

+

+++

+++

+

+

+

+

Italy

+

+++

++

++

+

+++

+++

+

++

+

++

Portugal

++

+++

++

+++

+

+++

+++

+

++

+

++

Greece

+++

+++

++

++

+++

+++

+++

+

++

+

+++

Albania

+++

++

+++

++

+++

+

+

+++

+++

+++

+++

Key:

+++ : H

igh importance

++ : M

edium im

portance +

: Low im

portance -

: Not know

n

3. Gap analysis and responses 3.1 Identification of gaps in forest fire management Responding to forest fires is a complicated task, because forest fires are themselves of complex nature, both in natural and political terms. A successful fire fighting strategy must address the root causes of the phenomenon and take long term measures while at the same time including rapid response measures in order to minimize damages. Fire should not be viewed as an enemy, while at the same time protection from forest fires should be part of almost all sectoral policies in the Mediterranean. The numbers and the trends observed reveal that fire fighting strategies taken by the governments and the EU and UN around the Mediterranean have failed to control forest fires. The root causes have been analyzed in the previous chapters and are connected with major gaps in the procedures followed so far.

The evaluation of the effectiveness of forest fire policies is not straightforward. The measure commonly used is the ratio of burned area per fire. This measure indicates the effectiveness of the fire suppression mechanism and especially the so-called “initial attack”, which is the most crucial factor of success from an operational point of view. This measure is however very sensitive to the methodologies used to estimate the number of fires and the area burned, as was seen in the first chapter. This ratio is therefore inaccurate and not comparable between different countries or years. Furthermore, it contains no information about the policies that exist to protect forests from fire, since suppression effectiveness is only a small part of it.

Following the conclusions on the root causes of forest fires, a number of issues must be addressed to increase the effectiveness of a short and long term response policy, coupled with effectiveness indicators (qualitative and in few cases quantitative). The most important are:

Strategy

• The existence of pan-Mediterranean cooperations in term of knowledge flow,

consultation, meetings, capacity building courses, common reporting and research, with effect and influence on the shape of policies and strategies for forest fire management.

• Common understanding about the context of the terms prevention, suppression, pre-suppression and restoration for all Mediterranean countries, in order to have common international measures and a proper distribution of funds.

• The existence of a common Mediterranean forest fire strategy, arranging the flow of funds, knowledge, equipment and technology for the whole of the Mediterranean, influencing and defining the relevant policies of the individual countries and the international actors, such as the EU, the UN, the WB and others.

• The level of a planned and well coordinated involvement of local communities in forest fire management in all phases is an indicator for efficiency of a forest fire management strategy. Local involvement should be achieved by both

specific regulations followed by their implementation and through an increased volluntear participation. For example the participation of professional loggers in prevention and suppression operations is often a very positive indicator.

• The level of awareness about the benefits of the forest for the prosperity and the quality of life of the people in local, national and regional level.

• The existence of a transectoral forest fire policy within each country, which coordinates measures for fire prevention, pre-suppression, suppression and restoration. This policy must be independent and include objectives related to forest firefighting and at the same time propose forest fire issues that should be considered by other policies, such as urban planning, tourism development, waste management, energy and transportation networks, agriculture and forestry.

• A balance in expenses for real prevention / suppression and pre-suppression in the national and EU level. Financing and organising ground forces is a good element for effective firefighting.

• A sufficient forest protection mechanism that includes measures against land conversion after the fire and efficient legislation and implementation tools to promote all rules concerning forest fire prevention. This should include a clear ownership and land use status.

• The existence of national and EU forest policies that focus on the Mediterranean character of the forests and rank fire management high.

• The existence of a horizontal and integrated EU forest fire policy, including measures for fire prevention, pre-suppression, suppression and restoration. This policy must be independent and include objectives related to forest firefighting that may relate to several Directorates-General, including DG Agriculture, DG Environment, DG Research and DG Public Protection.

• Increased EU money spent for forest fires and special regulations aiming against the root causes of the phenomenon in the Mediterranean would be a good indicator for a successful policy. This should include all Mediterranean countries.

Technical aspects

• The high level of local knowledge about methodologies for forest fire

management, such as the balance between prevention and suppression, the correct use of ground forces during suppression operations, the maintenance and training of local emergency groups in case of fire, the way the first attack is succeeded, the coordination bodies that should be contacted, the hierarchy, etc.

• The existence of well equipped, trained and experienced national and local coordination units that are responsible for the effectiveness of all measures concerning forest fires.

• The existence of detailed management plans about the use of fire for range improvement, agriculture and forestry that are safely implemented on the ground. This should include fuel management for forest fire prevention.

Information • The quality of the data concerning forest fires, organized in accessible and

well-maintained databases, following reliable methodologies, comparable with other countries of the region.

• The detailed and dependable knowledge on the causes of forest fires in databases, folowing international standards and procedures, in order to be able ot compare the causes between the countries. A low level of unknown causes is a good indicator about the quality of the investigation.

• The existense of estimations about the impacts of forest fires in the economy, quality of life, etc. Again there must be comparable and reliable data organised in databases and accessible from anybody in the region.

3.2 Logical Framework / Strategic Plan on suggested WWF/IUCN activities Goal To control and reverse the catastrophic effects to nature and society of forest fires in the Mediterranean region, by addressing the root causes underlying them Objective 1 To introduce and re-activate a forest management policy and practices that will take into account the need for prevention and suppression of forest fires Actions To work with all relevant partners (governments, NGOs, International organizations) for the establishment of an appropriate policy focusing on forests and forest fires. To introduce in the relevant policies a focus on forest fires and the appropriate management practices to prevent them. To work with the authorities involved in each country in order to shift the fire-fighting mechanism and funds from fire suppression to prevention. To work with the EU, governments and local people to increase economic activities in and depending on the forest, providing income and employment to local people.

Targets Forest must not any longer be the lesser part of agricultural policy at a national and EU level. To shift the focus from a timber production and harvesting management model to a fuel and space management in the Mediterranean. More funds invested and better planning done to avoid the outbreak of catastrophic fires and enhance the pre-suppression stage. To increase the incremental value of forest for local people and the governments.

Objective 2 To increase the integration of forest management and prevention of forest fires in other sectoral or thematic policies, in order to control the root causes related to forest fires. Actions To do a detailed analysis of the main sectoral policies of the EU and (if possible) countries, identify the gaps in relation to forest fires and promote the integration of the necessary provisions in them Review the legal establishment of the forest status of land, and identify the gaps and failures in preserving it at a national and EU level.

Targets Address the main policies (i.e. Land use / Urban development, Tourism, Transport / Energy networks, Agriculture) and address their gaps in a homogenous and credible manner. Create a stronger legal basis securing the status of forest from any improper land use change.

Objective 3 To intervene and assist the national and international authorities in shifting the focus from fire suppression to prevention Actions Get in close contact with the national authorities that coordinate fire-fighting and provide critical analysis and technical support to assist and enhance their operation. Lobby and provide the appropriate arguments to support the need in investments (material and training) in prevention as opposed to suppression means. Work with local people (training, awareness, provision of tools, seminars) in order to involve them actively in fire prevention and pre-suppression operations.

Targets An improved coordination and intervention approach of the fire-fighting mechanism in all countries. Shift the focus from suppression only to a well-balanced prevention / suppression mechanism. Increase the role and participation of local people in fire-fighting.

Objective 4 Improve the availability of data and information on forest fires, in order to have a basis on which to better plan the necessary strategies against them. Actions Work with the governments and international actors, provide expertise and lobby for the improvement of the data collection on forest fires. Produce a technical tool on the definitions and methods of collection of data on forest fires, and lobby for its use by all the parties involved. Produce a technical tool for the methodology to be followed on the analysis of the causes of forest fires, and lobby for its use at a national and international level. Produce a methodology, on the basis of socio-economic criteria for the analysis of the direct and indirect effects of forest fires.

Targets Ensure that the data on which forest fire-fighting strategy is based is available, dependable, homogenous and open to access. Ensure a common and homogenous methodology for the monitoring of forest fires and their causes in the Mediterranean. Ensure a common approach on the analysis on forest fire causes, in order to have comparable information for the development of national and pan-Mediterranean strategies. Ensure a common approach for the analysis of the direct and indirect effects of forest fires.

Objective 5 To enhance the research efforts on forest fires and promote the collaboration between Mediterranean countries on the issue Actions Lobby for the focusing of research on forest fires, besides technical issues on the appropriate policies and their results, causes, effects, and forest management practices. To enhance the exchange of information, experience and collaboration between the key actors in the Mediterranean. Organise seminars, workshops and a newsletter for the exchange of views and experience.

Targets To use the results of research for the development of the policy and strategies on forest fires in the Mediterranean. To capitalize on the existing knowledge and experience for the promotion of a Pan-Mediterranean approach on the issue of forest fires.

Objective 6 Increase the public awareness on the value of forest and the issue of forest fires in the Mediterranean. Actions Implement an awareness campaign on the values and uses of forests and the direct and indirect values for local people. Information and awareness campaign on forest fires and their causes and impacts.

Targets To increase the involvement of local people in the management and protection of forest, and their involvement in forest fire prevention and suppression. To involve the public, through active participation in forest fire prevention and suppression (local people).

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