It’s like trying to catch smoke. Forest-fire haze drifting from Indonesia to neighbouring countries every dry season has eluded domestic efforts to curb it. Land clearing by burning is prohibited by administrative, criminal and civil laws in Indonesia, but putting polluters on trial remains a challenge. Underexplored legal avenues may provide new solutions to the decades-old problem.
Forest and land fires in Indonesia have attracted global attention since the great fires in 1982–83 and 1997–98. Large haze events occurred again in 2007, 2012 and 2015, causing international alarm and cross-border pollution throughout Southeast Asia. Smoke from these sorts of fires is the biggest source of air pollution in Indonesia after transportation and energy emissions.
Companies – mostly oil-palm producers – have used fire as a tool to clear forests and peatland areas for agriculture, even though Indonesia and Malaysia are well aware of the need to strictly enforce bans on the practice.
