A bulldozer sits on the side of Grayback Road in the devastation that left scores of structures destroyed and thousands of acres burned by the Slater fire in Happy Camp, Calif., on Tuesday, September 29, 2020. For millennia, the local Karuk tribe has conducted traditional prescribed burns in the area, and put together a climate change adaptation plan, a big piece of which is returning traditional fire to the landscape. They want Cal Fire to allow California tribal leaders to begin a training program in controlled burning techniques used for centuries by Native Americans until Europeans arrived and halted the practice, leading to overgrown forests. | Carlos Avila Gonzalez/The San Francisco Chronicle via Getty Images
Nations need to spend more money learning to live with wildfires rather than burning through cash fighting them, says a new United Nations report. The report predicts a dramatic rise in “extreme” fires and warns that there needs to be a “radical” shift in how governments address them.
Globally, extreme wildfires are expected to increase up to 14 percent this decade and 50 percent by the end of the century. Conventional firefighting, which tackles blazes as they happen, won’t be enough to meet the new threats, says the report published today by the United Nations Environment Programme and Norwegian environmental nonprofit GRID-Arendal.
To cope, the report says, two-thirds of government spending on wildfires ought to go towards preparing…
