Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso, Facultad de Agronomía, Quillota, Chile.
Center for Climate and Resilience Research (CR(2)), University of Chile, Santiago, Chile; Facultad de Ciencias Agronómicas, Universidad de Chile, Santiago, Chile.
Sci Total Environ. 2022 Mar 1;810:152002. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2021.152002. Epub 2021 Nov 29.
Sustained human pressures on the environment have significantly increased the frequency, extent, and severity of wildfires, globally. This is particularly the case in Mediterranean regions, in which human-caused wildfires represent up to 90% of all recorded wildfire ignitions. In Chile, it has been estimated that nearly 90% of wildfires are related to human activities, and that their frequency and distribution have steadily increased over the last decade. Despite this, the role of socio-economic factors in driving wildfire activity and its spatiotemporal distribution remains unclear. In this study, we assess the association between socio-economic drivers and spatiotemporal patterns of wildfires in the Mediterranean region of south-central Chile over the period 2010-2018. Our results show that 98.5% of wildfires are related to human activities, either accidentally (58.2%) or intentionally (36.6%). Wildfires occurred primarily during the summer months and their density at the commune-level was associated with increased road access, as well as with the percentage of land covered by agriculture, exotic tree plantations, and native forest. Wildfire activity at the commune-level was also related to socio-economic variables such as population density, proportion of indigenous population, and unemployment rate, although such associations varied considerably depending on the region and on whether the wildfire was started accidentally or intentionally. Our study provides a comprehensive and interdisciplinary assessment of the complex ways in which land-cover and socio-economic factors drive the distribution of wildfire activity in south-central Chile. It represents an important guide for policy-making, as well a baseline for research into strategies aimed at predicting and mitigating wildfire activity at both local and national levels.
人为对环境的持续压力大大增加了野火的发生频率、范围和严重程度，在全球范围内皆是如此。在地中海地区尤其如此，人为引发的野火占所有记录野火起火的 90%。在智利，据估计近 90%的野火与人类活动有关，而且过去十年中其频率和分布稳步增加。尽管如此，社会经济因素在驱动野火活动及其时空分布方面的作用仍不清楚。在这项研究中，我们评估了社会经济驱动因素与 2010-2018 年智利中南部地中海地区野火时空模式之间的关联。研究结果表明，98.5%的野火与人类活动有关，要么是偶然的（58.2%），要么是故意的（36.6%）。野火主要发生在夏季，其在公社层面的密度与增加的道路通达度以及农业、外来树木种植园和本地森林覆盖的土地百分比有关。公社层面的野火活动也与人口密度、土著人口比例和失业率等社会经济变量有关，尽管这种关联因地区和野火是偶然还是故意引发而有很大差异。本研究对土地覆盖和社会经济因素驱动智利中南部野火活动分布的复杂方式进行了全面的跨学科评估。它为政策制定提供了重要的指导，也为旨在预测和减轻地方和国家层面野火活动的策略研究提供了基准。
