Bulgaria - FIRE RES

CONTEXT

In Bulgaria, about one third of the territory is forests and mainly State-owned (76%). On average, Bulgaria experiences 600 forest fires annually that affect 10,000 hectares and cause 2.5 million euro of direct losses.

The Living Lab will be the Stara Zagora region. This site is characterized by a variety of forest types – typical deciduous (coppice oak), but also large coniferous plantations at low altitude.

The Living Lab is an area with frequent forest fires during the dry summer and autumn periods – 110 fires have occurred in the 2005-2020 period burning a total of 5,000 ha (of which 1/4 were crown fires). Fire ignitions are natural, but also man-made – usually fires start from agriculture lands.

FIRE MANAGEMENT IN BULGARIA

In Bulgaria, fire suppression is done mostly with “soft” sylvicultural measures following the “Plans for protection of forest territories from fires”.

Thefire suppression management is led by the Fire Fighting Service assisted by Forestry workers and Volunteer groups (governed by the local mayor). The Civil Protection Service is integrated in the Fire Fighting Service.

CHALLENGES

Dramatic increase of fires after 1990s (i.e. Kresna fire, 2017, 1600 hectares)
Low level of training and preparedness for response in wildfires among foresters and volunteer groups, which are involved in fire-fighting
Insurance schemes are not used except for private homes (quite unpopular)
Limited number of agriculture lands have insurances
Large parts of forests in Bulgaria are within Natura2000 areas, so certain limitations apply in forest management activities