Europe is burning. From France to Spain, from Portugal to Greece, and even in Britain, the continent has been engulfed by flames this summer. In France, more than 117,000 hectares have been lost to a succession of wildfires and nearly a quarter of a million people have been evacuated. It’s already been dubbed ‘the worst season of fire in history’.
In Madrid, Paris and in other European capitals, politicians argue about the fires – or rather the response to them. The lack of fire-fighting aircraft in France, for example, has been seized on by opponents of Emmanuel Macron’s government.
Some of the media have focused on the human aspect: the fact that the majority of the fires have been started by people, either inadvertently or deliberately. Hundreds of arrests (predominantly young males) have been made by European police forces and in France courts intend to take ‘tougher criminal action’ to deal with fire-starters.
Abandoned farmland and unmanaged forests have created the conditions for a perfect firestorm
But all this misses the crucial point, as Matt Ridley wrote in this week’s magazine. Most of Europe has made a mess of its wildfire management strategy this century. Ridley quoted Andrew Gilruth, chief executive of the Moorland Association, who explained: ‘In England the authorities are obsessed with rewilding and restricting all commonsense measures for reducing fuel loads.’
