Preventing disastrous runaway veld fires

Roughly 60% of South Africa’s natural landscapes are prone to fires.

With very few exceptions, natural fire return cycles can last two years in wet grasslands, or 45 years in drier parts of the country. 

Natural and man made fires are vastly different, with the latter ideally being avoided at all costs. 

But this is a challenge in South Africa, due to its drought cycles, water scarcity and susceptibility to experiencing the harsher side of climate change. 

As showcased in recent weeks, fires swept through prime farming provinces, the Free State, North West and Northern Cape. 

The fires were reportedly caused by protest action, and sparks from angle grinding machines. 

In under one week, an estimated 100,000 hectares of land belonging to 339 farmers was destroyed, largely due to dry and windy conditions fanning the fires. 

Fires can be avoided, but the likelihood that they will occur due to human error is strong. Instead, it is best to analyse how to minimise the economic damage and maximise environmental resilience, especially in light of increasing temperatures due to climate change. 

Department of Environment, Forestry and Fisheries (Deff) communications director Zolile Nqayi said there were a number of actions that individuals and communities can take, in order to minimise the negative impacts of fires. 

“The challenge is to optimise the effects of these fires, minimising economic damage and maximising environmental resilience. To ensure this, communities need an effective fire detection system, and the necessary fire protection measures need to be taken, e.g., fire breaks.”

Fire breaks are burnt each year to reduce the risk of large-scale fires. 

Nqayi explained that fuel loads need to be managed, sometimes through prescribed burning, and other times during the physical removal of biomass. 

“Land users must ensure that they have the necessary equipment to suppress wildfires while they are still small,” he advised, adding that landowners being able to organise themselves to collectively contain fires would be ideal. 

He said there was also a need for effectiveness awareness programmes to take place, which consider fuel loads, weather conditions and the availability of resources to contain fires. 

This is because every second counts, and being available and regularly updated on fire danger indices are critical, Nqayi emphasised. 

He said some “progressive farmers” do prescribed burning, which manipulates the flammability of their fields by creating “a mosaic of veld ages.” Others apply a patch-burn system, to rejuvenate their vegetation. 

Another effective tactic uses intensive grazing regimes to reduce the biomass loads, which in the process reduces the risk of an intense runaway fire. This, Nqayi said, was very effective in wetter grasslands. 

Letting fuel loads, or combustible material such as veld, build up, however, is a recipe for disaster, as this feeds the fire, increasing the intensity and the likelihood of more damage, Nqayi explained. 

Managing fires involves individuals, communities and authorities working together. 

Nqayi said in the recent Free State fires, around 16 Working on Fire (WoF) teams were dispatched on the front lines. And at any given time, there are roughly 5,000 firefighters at WoF that can be deployed across the country’s fire-prone biomes. 

But for individual landowners to act quickly is essential, especially as the world braces for the physical impacts of climate change. 

“We know that climate change leads to more regular disaster events with increased intensities,” Nqayi warned. 

“The intervals between severe droughts are getting less, and when they do happen, they are more severe due to increased temperatures and other climatic conditions.”

He added that droughts are often broken by intense rainfall, which results in more fuel loads in the dry seasons that follow, which in turn leads to an increase in the risk of runaway fires. 

This was witnessed in the Free State, North West and Northern Cape fires, with unseasonably windy conditions, likely due to warmer temperatures. 

“We cannot manage droughts, we can only manage land and water resources in ways that will minimise the impacts of droughts,” Nqayi said, for example, maximising base cover protecting perennial grasses, preventing bush encroachment and alien plant invasions, and preventing the loss of topsoil. 

“By being proactive, farmers and land users can increase their resilience and the reliability of their livelihoods.”

For more news your way, download The Citizen’s app for iOS and Android.