Southeast Asian Haze News

JAKARTA — Fires razed nearly 1 million hectares (2.47 million acres) of lands and forests in Indonesia in 2023, as the country suffered from unusually scorching weather due to El…

Ely Marlina’s 2-year-old child began to cough as the wildfires enveloped Indonesia’s Ketapang district in the summer of 2019. The little one soon fell ill with an acute respiratory tract…

Regional governments in wildfire-hit Indonesia shuttered schools in the first week October, as sickly air pollution continued to cloak several population centers in Kalimantan and Sumatra. Local authorities in Central…

JAKARTA — A new analysis has found a Switzerland-sized area of tropical peatland in Indonesia is at high risk of fire. More than half of the 3.8 million hectares (9.4…

JAKARTA — Indonesia’s highest court has upheld a $61 million fine against an oil palm company over massive fires on its plantation that razed an area seven times the size…

PEKANBARU, Indonesia — Intensive efforts in recent years to prevent fires in Indonesia’s Riau province, the country’s perennial epicenter of forest and land fires, will be put to the test…

JAKARTA — Indonesia's Supreme Court has ruled President Joko Widodo not liable in the disastrous fires in 2015 that devastate large swathes of rainforests and peatlands in the country, despite…

JAKARTA — A new analysis warns of the potential for forest fires in Indonesia that could spread smoke to neighboring countries as this year’s dry season sets in, following two…

JAKARTA — Indonesia’s land and forest fires burned a greater area this year than in 2020, with most of the fires occurring in West Nusa Tenggara and East Nusa Tenggara,…

JAKARTA — Favorable weather conditions point to a less severe forest fire season in Indonesia this year, but the burning could still compound what is now the worst coronavirus situation…

JAKARTA — Milder weather is expected to bring about a less severe forest fire season across Indonesia this year compared to 2019. But cutbacks to fire-prevention measures as a result…

JAKARTA — Forest fires are starting to break out in parts of Indonesia as the dry season gets underway, threatening to compound respiratory illnesses amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Fires have…

JAKARTA — Indonesian President Joko Widodo has demanded accountability from his top officials over the land and forest fires that hit the country last year, as the government braces for…

JAKARTA — Land and forest fires in Indonesia cost the country $5.2 billion in damage and economic losses this year, equivalent to 0.5% of its economy, according to a new…

JAKARTA — The Indonesian government has attempted to downplay the scale of its land and forest fires this year by saying things weren’t as bad as in the Amazon or…

JAKARTA — Fires from land and forest fires across Indonesia this year have pumped at least 708 million tons of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere — almost double the emissions…

PALEMBANG, Indonesia — Aerial images taken last month in the southern part of Indonesia’s Sumatra Island show wildfires burning through peat forests and producing clouds of toxic smoke. Peatlands in…

JAKARTA — Fires in Indonesia have razed an area the size of Puerto Rico, following a sharp spike in burning in September. The fires this year, the worst since 2015,…

UPANG CERIA/GELEBAK DALAM, Indonesia — Boat drivers sometimes decide not to work when the smoke is thick on the Musi River out of fear of a dangerous collision. For the…

JAKARTA — At least three companies whose concessions were burned in the 2015 fires that razed huge swaths of forest in Indonesia are also caught up in this year’s fires,…

PEKANBARU, Indonesia — September 16 was a happy day for Evan Zendrato and Lasma Yani Zega. The young couple gave birth to a boy weighing 2.8 kilograms (6.1 pounds). They…

SAMARINDA, Indonesia — Indonesia’s wildfire emergency has spread to the part of eastern Borneo where President Joko Widodo wants to relocate the nation’s capital. On Aug. 26, President Widodo announced…

JAKARTA — Indonesia’s president has admitted negligence on the part of the government, as top officials engage in a blame game amid the worst spate of forest fires since 2015…

JAKARTA — Indonesia’s environment minister risks undermining the country’s credibility if she continues denying, in the face of overwhelming data, that haze from Indonesian forest fires is affecting neighboring Malaysia…

JAMBI, Indonesia — Clouds of haze have blanketed parts of Jambi province on the Indonesian island of Sumatra, as slash-and-burn clearing to make way for oil palm plantations rages on.…

Hotspots signaling fires in Indonesian Borneo and Sumatra have increased nearly sevenfold over a four-day period in September, according to official reports. The national disaster management agency on Sept. 2…

Three years after forest fires in Indonesia sent huge volumes of smoke billowing into Malaysia and Singapore, the Southeast Asian neighbors are dealing with a repeat of the “embarrassing” transboundary…

JAKARTA — Indonesia’s highest court has upheld a ruling holding the government, including the president, liable for the disastrous forest fires and resultant haze that blanketed large swaths of the…

Helping the Indonesian government prosecute companies accused of environmental crimes is a risky job. Last year, Bambang Hero Saharjo, the Indonesian environment ministry’s chief expert witness against plantation companies accused…

JAKARTA — Oil palm and logging companies in Indonesia have come into public glare once again as another season of forest fires flares up in Sumatra. Hotspots have been detected…