Spring Wildfire 'Warning'... Korea Forest Service Tightens Punishment for Offenders and Strengthens Wildfire Prevention Activities

The Korea Forest Service's ultra-large wildfire suppression helicopter is conducting firefighting activities at a wildfire site. The photo is unrelated to the article. Provided by the Korea Forest Service.

[Asia Economy (Daejeon) Reporter Jeong Il-woong] #Mr. A was prosecuted in 2016 for causing a forest fire in the Goun-ri area of Suanbo-myeon, Chungju-si, Chungbuk Province, and was sentenced to 10 months in prison along with a compensation claim of 80 million won. Although the forest fire was caused by a simple mistake while burning trash near the forest, the responsibility that fell on Mr. A was heavy. From 2015 to 2019, about 700 forest fire offenders like Mr. A were caught, with fines averaging 1.73 million won per person and prison sentences up to 3 years.

According to the Korea Forest Service on the 17th, Article 53, Paragraph 5 of the Forest Protection Act stipulates that even forest fires caused by simple mistakes can result in imprisonment of up to 3 years or fines up to 30 million won if the offender is caught. Additionally, Article 750 of the Civil Act holds forest fire offenders liable for damages separately from the Forest Protection Act.

This became possible through the amendment of the Forest Protection Act, which took effect on June 28, 2017. The core of the amendment is that even forest fires caused by negligence rather than intent can result in both criminal punishment and civil liability for compensation.

The Korea Forest Service raised the level of punishment for forest fire offenders through the amendment due to a sense of crisis caused by the frequent occurrence of forest fires in spring each year, mainly due to careless acts such as visitors’ careless fires and burning of field and farm waste.

For example, from 2010 to 2019, the average annual number of forest fires was 440 cases (damage area 857.18 hectares), of which 254 cases (damage area 596.78 hectares) occurred mainly from March to May each year.

Most notably, by cause (based on an average of 440 cases per year), the breakdown was ▲careless fires by visitors 152 cases (34%) ▲burning of field and farm edges 71 cases (16%) ▲trash burning 62 cases (14%) ▲building fires 21 cases (5%) ▲cigarette careless fires 18 cases (4%) ▲careless fires by grave visitors 16 cases (3%) ▲children playing with fire 2 cases (1%) ▲others 100 cases (23%). Based on this, the Korea Forest Service judges that human-caused forest fires account for more than 70% of all forest fires.

Park Jong-ho, the Commissioner of the Korea Forest Service, presided over the "National Wildfire Safety Officers Meeting (Video Conference)" on the 12th. The meeting was attended by 28 related organizations, including 16 city and provincial wildfire management agencies excluding Daegu City, the Ministry of the Interior and Safety, the Ministry of Environment, the Ministry of National Defense, the National Fire Agency, the Korea Meteorological Administration, and the Cultural Heritage Administration. Photo by Korea Forest Service

In spring, large-scale forest fires with damage areas exceeding 100 hectares also occur frequently. In fact, from 2010 to 2019, large forest fires occurred as follows: 4 cases in 2011 in Uljin, 1 case in 2013 in Pohang and Ulju, 1 case in 2017 in Gangneung, 1 case in 2018 in Goseong, and 3 cases in 2019 in Goseong, Sokcho, Gangneung, and Donghae, all caused by human factors. The Korea Forest Service explained that the damage caused by these large forest fires accounted for about 50% of the total annual forest loss area.

Therefore, the Korea Forest Service focuses on raising public awareness of forest fire risks through publicity of punishment regulations for forest fire offenders, operation of forest fire reporting and reward systems, and various campaigns around March to May every year.

The Korea Forest Service designates the period from March 14 to April 15 as a special countermeasure period for large forest fires and concentrates its efforts on forest fire prevention and control. Especially this year, in response to the Korea Meteorological Administration’s forecast of more hot and dry days than usual, the Korea Forest Service plans to flexibly deploy seven forest fire-fighting helicopters in Gangwon and Gyeonggi provinces and strengthen cooperation systems with related agencies such as the Fire Department and the Ministry of National Defense.

In addition, to prevent illegal burning such as burning of field and farm edges, which is one of the main causes of forest fires, and careless fires by visitors, the Korea Forest Service operates a regional responsibility system for monitoring personnel and deploys a ‘drone monitoring team’ in blind spots to enable efficient forest fire monitoring and prevention.

Park Jong-ho, Administrator of the Korea Forest Service, said, “While it is important to quickly extinguish forest fires when they occur, preparing in advance before forest fires happen is also a crucial task for the Korea Forest Service.” He emphasized, “Strengthening punishment for forest fire offenders is not only about imposing heavier responsibility on offenders but mainly aims to raise public awareness of forest fire risks in spring.”

He added, “The Korea Forest Service will devote all efforts to forest fire prevention and control activities during this year’s special countermeasure period for large forest fires,” and “We ask each citizen to join in supporting these efforts.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.