The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) on August 11 launched a new online portal on timely fire information and monitoring to help countries control fire effectively and protect property and natural resources.
The new Global Fire Information Management System (GFIMS) will provide information on fire hotspots from satellites operated by the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).
The data on fire hotspots will be available on the GFIMS online mapping interface just two and a half hours after the satellite passes overhead. The new system also allows users to receive email alerts on specific areas of interest, enabling subscribers to react quickly.
According to FAO’s statistics, vegetation fires affect an estimated 350 million ha of land each year – and about half or more of this area is burnt in Africa . However, people have faced difficulties in obtaining timely satellite-derived information on fires.
"The GFIMS has been launched at a time when the incidence of megafires is tending to increase," said Pieter van Lierop, FAO Forestry Officer, who is responsible for the agency's activities in fire management.
"The control of these fires has become an issue of high importance, not only because of the increasing number of casualties and the huge amounts of area burned but also because of issues of global interest, like climate change," he said./.
The new Global Fire Information Management System (GFIMS) will provide information on fire hotspots from satellites operated by the US National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).
The data on fire hotspots will be available on the GFIMS online mapping interface just two and a half hours after the satellite passes overhead. The new system also allows users to receive email alerts on specific areas of interest, enabling subscribers to react quickly.
According to FAO’s statistics, vegetation fires affect an estimated 350 million ha of land each year – and about half or more of this area is burnt in Africa . However, people have faced difficulties in obtaining timely satellite-derived information on fires.
"The GFIMS has been launched at a time when the incidence of megafires is tending to increase," said Pieter van Lierop, FAO Forestry Officer, who is responsible for the agency's activities in fire management.
"The control of these fires has become an issue of high importance, not only because of the increasing number of casualties and the huge amounts of area burned but also because of issues of global interest, like climate change," he said./.
