Efforts to reduce wildfires ablaze across Indonesia will be challenging as the El Niño weather phenomenon will peak this month, the forestry minister said on Tuesday, describing the devastation as largely man-made.Indonesia has intensified efforts to contain haze from forest and land fires across six provinces in Kalimantan and Sumatra islands. The haze has caused respiratory illnesses and forced thousands of schools to move classes online, including in neighbouring Malaysia.
The "super-El Niño" weather conditions exacerbate the fires, causing drought.
Hot spots were reduced across Kalimantan and Sumatra by the end of August, minister Raja Juli Antoni said.
"Our problems are not over. September is the peak of El Niño," he said. "September is the main fight for us."
The haze caused more than 50,000 cases of acute respiratory infection across seven provinces between July and August, health ministry official Andi Saguni said on Tuesday.
