THE FOREST FIRE HAZARD MAPPING IN BHUTAN

Abstract

The study intends to assimilate data for assessing fire hazards for the forest areas in Bhutan. Over the past few decades, there has been an increase in fire events and forest fires have made it urgent to research this issue. Bhutan documented 1,403 occurrences of forest fires in less than ten years (Kuensel, 11th Jan. 2020). Many fossil fuels are burned during forest fires, and a significant amount of carbon dioxide is produced, which adds to the most prevalent greenhouse gas and changes for the regional climate. Moreover, studies have indicated that one of the influential elements contributing to forest fires is climate change. The goal of this research is to consolidate all datasets from multiple sources onto a single GIS platform for the creation of maps that take climatic conditions into account while calculating forest fire hazard. To lessen the risk of forest fires, recommendations and adaptation methods are offered in this paper. In particular, the Department of Forest and Park Services in Bhutan can benefit from the findings of this research for the development, planning, and implementation works.