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TODAY Tuesday 23 September 1997 Each weekday. Conn Nugent on what's new in the world, on the site.

 

TODAY IN THE WORLD: Fire!

Far from the notice of America, unreported by any major US newspaper, a great environmental disaster unfolds in Southeast Asia.

Early last month Indonesian landowners set fires on the giant islands of Sumatra and Borneo. The fires were intended to clear natural forests in order to make way for agricultural and sylvacultural plantations ("Up in Flames"). The practice is illegal in Indonesia but common, as it is all through the tropics. This time, though, the weather conspired to turn an unfortunate custom into a great regional catastrophe: drought and wind combined so that the fires grew uncontrollably. They burn unchecked today.

Enormous thick clouds of smoke migrate across the region. The air in Jakarta, never clean, is now an unrelieved haze. Singapore suffers its worst pollution ever. Malaysia is especially hard hit. Schools have been closed there, and the national government is planning for the evacuation of Kuala Lumpur, where hospitalizations from lung disorders have skyrocketed. Evacuate a national capital!

Unsurprisingly, the Malaysians and Thais and Singaporeans are leaning pretty hard on the Indonesians to put out the fires. The Indonesian government issues resolute statements on the perfidy of the burners and the national determination to stop the fires, but their reach is limited. The fires are burning in remote portions of the islands, and there's not much in the way of fire-suppression equipment. The implicated landowners aren't doing anything. It looks like a steady soaking rain is the only hope.

From a single disaster you can't draw too much. But you wonder. Deforestation, climate change, rapid urbanization. The abstractions of policy papers can cross-fertilize and leap into life, in unsuspected patterns of being. The capacity of nature to catch us off guard may now be enhanced by the actions of the people surprised.

 

TODAY ON THE SITE:

From the Great Lakes Amy Nevala reports today that there's nothing like personal experience. If you want to get people to learn about a body of water, put them on a boat ("vessel-based education" is the lyrical term used by professionals). The success on Lake Michigan that Amy describes is heartening: dedicated teachers, engaged students, energized citizens. It may be that far from the sturm und drang of enviro politics, the unsung environmental educators of the country have wrought a truly consequential but quiet revolution. Schoolkids, soccer parents, retirees are discovering within themselves a connection to the natural world that is stronger and richer than they had suspected. And their numbers are growing. One of the pleasant surprises of the next century may be the emergence of a new and forceful American constituency for the protection of local ecosystems.

 

Recent "Today" columns:

9/23: More Logging and Fishing
9/22: "Here, Sir, the People Rule"
9/18: Dr. Pangloss and the Land Mine Treaty
9/17: Outsourcing Pollution
9/16: In the Preservation of the Funky
9/15: The Problem With Health
9/12: The Automobile Crisis of 2020
9/11: Gratifyingly Inept Adversary
9/10: The Porkbarrel Works for You
9/09: Climate Change Changes

To access more "Today" columns, click "Archives" below.