Every summer we witness the terrifying spectacle of fires devastating thousands of hectares of our unique woodland heritage. The work of eco-mafias and arsonists is nothing new — it is an annual ritual. The alarming figures in the editorial by the president of Legambiente.
The drought and the wind, a cigarette butt carelessly tossed from a car window, a shepherd burning scrubland, a bolt of lightning from a sudden storm, the heavy hand of organised crime or that of a deranged arsonist.
Every summer we witness the terrifying spectacle of fires devastating thousands of hectares of territory. We follow with anxiety the operations of the civil protection services and the firefighters as they battle the flames in apocalyptic scenes. Emergency interventions — sometimes effective ones — that arrive, as so often happens in Italy, once the disaster has already occurred. As though a fate from which we cannot escape left us no other choice than to rush to extinguish a fire that has already taken hold. And yet the emergency of this scorching summer was entirely foreseeable. The work of eco-mafias and arsonists is nothing new — it is an annual ritual. Even the torrid heat and the drought could have been tackled in good time with effective prevention measures, which were lacking.
But let us take things in order. Legambiente has gathered and analysed data to take stock of the blazes devastating the Peninsula. The fire dossier presented on 12 July examines in detail the problems, critical issues and management delays. First, the picture of what is happening. From mid-June to mid-July, 26,024 hectares of woodland have gone up in smoke, equivalent to 93.8 per cent of the total area burned across the whole of 2016. The Italian regions most affected are Sicily, with 13,052 hectares destroyed by fire (with a relentless series of blazes in almost every province), followed by Calabria with 5,826 hectares, Campania 2,461, Lazio 1,635, Puglia 1,541, Sardinia 496, Abruzzo 328, Marche 264, Tuscany 200, Umbria 134 and Basilicata 84. Staggering figures that are set to rise — summer is still far from over.
The most significant finding to emerge from the dossier is that the management of the fire emergency has so far been marked by too many unjustified delays at both regional and national level, starting with the regions themselves, which have moved far too slowly, as those most devastated by the flames demonstrate. To date, Campania and Lazio have still not approved the woodland fire prevention plan (the Aib 2017 plan) and the related implementing measures for organising prevention, ground-level operations, and agreements with the fire service and civil protection. Calabria and Sicily have done so only in part, and very belatedly, while Sicily has also yet to conclude the agreement with the national fire service. The only exception is Puglia, which acted on both fronts in good time, though there is no news of the activation of the provincial operational centres (Cop). But the Aib plan alone is not enough to avert devastation and arson, unless it is accompanied by an effective organisational machinery and sustainable forest management policies, as the real situation makes clear.
To the delays must be added the insufficient number of teams of forestry workers, and above all the absence of strategies and climate adaptation measures. Into this picture also fits the reorganisation process of the functions of the former forestry corps, now absorbed into the Carabinieri, and the national delays caused by the fact that the government and the relevant ministries have yet to approve the implementing decrees needed to complete the transfer of responsibilities, personnel, tools and resources regarding woodland firefighting, so as to guarantee operational teams across the whole territory capable of managing the emergency and carrying out prevention activities.
It is also necessary to strengthen the system of checks and interventions by law enforcement against the criminals who start fires. Today, in addition to the offence of arson (article 423 bis of the criminal code), the eco-crimes law (no. 68/2015) can and must be applied — and in particular the offence of environmental disaster (article 452 quater of the criminal code), one of the new offences introduced by the law, which takes a tough line against those who threaten the health of ecosystems, increasing sentences to up to fifteen years' imprisonment plus aggravating circumstances.
Our country has a unique woodland heritage covering approximately 36 per cent of the national land area. It provides oxygen, food, pharmaceutical active compounds and fresh water, combats desertification, helps prevent soil erosion, acts as a natural carbon store and plays an important role in climate stabilisation and in countering global warming. Sadly, year after year forest fires cause the loss of thousands of hectares of this immense heritage, and the civil protection services estimate that over the past 30 years as much as 12 per cent of Italy's forest heritage has been lost. We cannot cede any more ground to fire.