Fire Management Programs Research Articles

Using a Cultural Keystone Species in Participatory Monitoring of Fire Management in Indigenous Lands in the Brazilian Savanna

There is a consensus that fire should be actively managed in tropical savannas to decrease wildfire risks, firefighting costs, and social conflicts as well as to promote ecosystem conservation. Selection and participatory monitoring of the effects of fire on cultural keystone species may be an efficient way to involve local stakeholders and inform management decisions. In this study, we investigated the effects of different fire regimes on a cultural keystone species in Central Brazil. With the support of diverse multiethnic groups of local fire brigades, we sampled Hancornia speciosa (Apocynaceae) populations across a vast regional range of 18 traditional territories (Indigenous Lands and Quilombola Territories) as well as four restricted Protected Areas. We considered areas under wildfires (WF), prescribed burns (PB) and fire exclusion (FE) and quantified tree mortality, canopy damage, loss of reproductive structures and fruit production following a simplified field protocol. Areas with H. speciosa populations were identified and classified according to their fire history, and in each sampled area, adult plants were evaluated. We hypothesized that WF would have larger negative impact on the population parameters measured, while FE would increase plant survival and fruit production. We found that tree mortality, canopy damage, and loss of reproductive structures were higher in areas affected by wildfires, which also had the lowest fruit production per plant compared to PB and FE areas, corroborating our hypotheses. However, we also found higher mortality in FE areas compared to PB ones, probably due to plant diseases in areas with longer FE. Considering these results and that the attempts to exclude fire from fire-prone ecosystems commonly lead to periodic wildfires, we argue that the Integrated Fire Management program in course in federal Protected Areas in Brazil—based on early dry season prescribed fires—is a good management option for this, and likely other, cultural keystone species in the Brazilian savanna.

Unburnt areas in subtropical woodlands contain distinct reptile communities after extensive wildfire

AbstractExtensive wildfires can have profound impacts on fauna communities by altering the vegetation structure and resource availability. However, unburnt areas within a fire mosaic may be important habitat for wildlife while the surrounding area recovers after fire. To understand the importance of unburnt vegetation for reptiles, we studied community assemblages at 15 burnt and 15 unburnt sites in a subtropical woodland 12 months after a 25 000 ha wildfire. We tested the relative importance of unburnt areas and structural attributes on reptile abundance, richness, and community composition across this landscape. Unburnt areas had higher species richness and diversity, but not overall abundance. Reptile community composition differed significantly between burnt and unburnt areas. Woody debris, which was retained in unburnt areas but depleted in burnt areas, was positively associated with increased reptile diversity and richness. Our results suggest that unburnt areas are vital for maintaining reptile diversity and richness within a woodland landscape after wildfire. These findings demonstrate the importance of ensuring fire management programs retain unburnt patches of vegetation in fire‐prone landscapes to sustain reptile communities.

Ecosystem‐wide responses to fire and large mammal herbivores in an African savanna

AbstractFire and large mammal herbivores (LMH) are the principal top‐down forces maintaining savanna structure. Nonetheless, experiments designed to investigate interactions between fire and LMH are rare in savannas, and relationships between environmental variation and biodiversity in the context of fire and LMH are poorly understood. This study addresses these gaps by manipulating the presence of LMH and early and late dry season fires in a tropical African savanna. In addition, this work simultaneously explores environmental variables including soil and foliar quality, vegetation cover, and nearby water sources to more holistically describe factors affecting savanna functioning and biodiversity. After 1 year of experimental treatments, changes in vegetation were already apparent. Shrub abundance and richness and grass richness were higher in the absence of LMH, while grass biomass increased three‐fold in burned plots as compared to unburned plots. Foliar nutrients tended to increase in open plots, while phenolics decreased. Amphibian abundance decreased with early burns and was higher with LMH. In contrast, small mammal abundance and richness increased without LMH and with time since fire. Richness and foraging of LMH were highest after late burns. These results demonstrate ecosystem‐wide effects of LMH, illustrating the importance of considering multiple taxa when designing fire management programs. For example, burning negatively affected amphibians and small mammals and changed vegetation at the same time it increased LMH foraging. In the long‐term, this experiment will shed light on interacting effects of fire and LMH on savanna biodiversity and function.Abstract in Portuguese is available with the online material.

Development of Immersive Virtual Reality Hospital Fire Management and Evacuation Training Program for Nursing Students in Hong Kong

While nursing students never experience hospital fire, they should know how to evacuate the patients under their care. Using Virtual Reality (VR) can offer students a unique leaning experience of this uncommon situation. The purpose of this study was to development a VR simulation program of a hospital fire evacuation training for the nursing students and evaluated the satisfaction of the participants. It was a pilot study conducted in a local private university offering a pre-registration, higher diploma of mental health nursing program. A VR simulation program regarding fire evacuation in a psychiatric hospital was newly developed. The students enrolled in the final year of this program were recruited by convenience sampling. A questionnaire was employed to evaluate participants' satisfaction after they completing the program. Descriptive statistics was employed to analyze the participants' characteristics and quantitative results of the questionnaires. The study was approved by the institution review board of the study university. The overall satisfaction of this workshop was 4.6/5 (n = 65). The highest score was the knowledge (4.7/5), presentation and facilitation skill (4.7/5) of facilitator. Half of the students rated excellent to the design, content and facilities of this workshop. In the narrative comment, some students were satisfied with authentic 3-dimension environment at the VR cave. Besides, the students treasured the chance to act as ward in-charge in evacuation. The first immersive VR simulation program for hospital fire management was developed and generally well-received by the nursing students.

What happens when fire is too early? Observations of fire‐stimulated fruit opening releasing underdeveloped seeds for an endemic Cerrado shrub

AbstractThe relation of fire with the reproductive process of species from tropical grasslands and savannas has long been investigated. Post‐fire flowering is well documented in the Cerrado, but fire‐mediated fruit opening and seed dispersal has rarely been described, with very few historical records being known. Even less is known about the effects of different fire seasons on species reproduction. Here, we describe the fire‐stimulated fruit opening of Jacaranda ulei, an endemic Cerrado shrub with medical importance to traditional communities. We show that fruits opened within 2 weeks after an early dry season fire, but there were almost no viable seeds as fruits were still immature when burned. When put together with the known records for other species, dry dehiscent fruits and anemochory arise as common traits that favour fire‐mediated fruit opening. As these are common attributes in the Cerrado, it is possible that several other species also have fire‐stimulated seed dispersal but remain vastly unnoticed and underreported in the literature. Additionally, the peak reproductive effort of these species coincides with the period of prescribed burns of the Integrated Fire Management Program and, consequently, several species could also have their reproductive cycle interrupted to disperse immature seeds. We hope our note encourages further studies on the fire‐mediated fruit opening and seed dispersal of Cerrado species, particularly in relation to fire season and seed quality.

Fire in Savannas and its Impact on Avifauna: Considerations for a Better Environmental Conservation

Savannas are a pyrophytic biome, a biodiversity hotspot, and have global importance, occupying 20% of the Earth's surface. It is a biome that requires burning to maintain its biodiversity and pyrodiversity. It has suffered from altered fire regimes due to the direct and indirect action of factors such as deforestation, agriculture, cattle ranching, and climate change, resulting in habitat loss, degradation, and fragmentation. This fact can impact the avifauna, changing population dynamics and distribution in the landscape. Thus, through a literature search, this study evaluated the influences of fire on avifauna populations in savannas. It was found that fire impacts avifauna directly or indirectly and acts positively or negatively, according to the niche of the species evaluated and its intrinsic characteristics. The observed effect will depend on the fire detection ability, locomotion capacity, species, habit, functional guild, demographic parameters, resource availability, post-disturbance successional evolution, dispersal ability, and the geographic scale of the area affected by the fire. The main impacts observed for this clade are indirect effects, and its most negatively impacted populations are the ratites and those with poor locomotion ability. Despite the many gaps in knowledge about the impact of fire on the population parameters of avifauna, studies that focus on community dynamics indicate that, in general, there are few changes in richness and abundance indices. Thus, a greater understanding of the consequences of fire on birds is necessary to support better the actions of the Integrated Fire Management Program and its expansion throughout the Brazilian territory in search of quality, dynamic, and integrated environmental management.

Factors Influencing the Performance of Fire Safety Management Program in Nigeria

Proper fire safety management program plays a critical role in achieving a desire fire safety objective in building. Therefore, several-studied have been conducted and shown that ineffective fire safety management program implementation is the main cause of failure in fire safety management. Thus, this paper aim at identify component influencing the performance of fire safety management program in building. One hundred and twenty (20) questionnaires were distributed to the relevant participants, which include Architects, Builders, Quantity Surveyor, Engineer, and Fire safety experts. In the end, 100 completed questionnaires were retrieved and analyzed with the use of descriptive and ranking analysis. The finding of the study revealed that the reliability of the instruments was higher than 0.7, and show that maintenance of fire safety equipment is the most influential component that affects the fire safety management program performance, while fire safety training and fire risk assessment were second and third most influential components of fire safety management program respectively. Hence, the study found to be that, non-maintenance, inadequate provision and non- functional fire safety equipment, often led to the main causes of fire disaster in buildings. Thus, the study suggests to the fire safety/building managers to implement adequate maintenance program, carried out proper fire safety training for the occupants, conduct regular fire risk assessment and increase fire safety budgetary allocation to the fire safety department in order to improve the maintenance/ replacement of fire safety equipment’s. It is anticipated that by improving the performance of fire safety equipment, provision of adequate training for the occupants/building owners, the rate of fire disasters could be minimized to a barest level.

Diffusion of indigenous fire management and carbon-credit programs: Opportunities and challenges for “scaling-up” to temperate ecosystems

Savanna burning programs across northern Australia generate millions of dollars per year for Indigenous communities through carbon and other greenhouse gas (GHG) markets. In catalyzing Indigenous knowledge and workforce to mitigate destructive wildfires, these programs are considered a success story on a range of social, ecological and economic measures. Scaling-up to temperate ecosystems requires a focus on applying the architecture and governance of these programs, and accounting for fundamental differences in context. We examine the opportunities and challenges in applying the architecture of savanna burning to an Indigenous Fire Management (IFM) program in central British Columbia, Canada (the Chilcotin). The Chilcotin project involves Yunesit’in and Xeni Gwet’in First Nations, and we draw from eight key elements of the Australian savanna burning model to identify a project area that includes Aboriginal title and reserve lands. The area encompasses Interior Douglas Fir (IDF) and Sub-Boreal Pine—Spruce (SBPS) biogeoclimatic zones, or dry forest and grassland ecosystems where low intensity fires are applied by community members to remove forest fuels, with the goal of mitigating wildfires and associated GHG emissions. The multi-decadal intervals between contemporary fires in the Chilcotin region make it challenging to accurately document historical fire location, scale and intensity, and thus to establish an emissions baseline. If this issue can be resolved, the British Columbia Forest Carbon Offset Protocol version 2 (FCOPv2) offers promise for developing verified carbon credits for three reasons: first, carbon (CO2), nitrous oxide (N2O), and methane (CH4), the three main GHG emissions from Indigenous fire management, are included in the protocol; second, credits under FCOPv2 are eligible for either compliance or voluntary markets, offering diversification; and third, a range of activities are eligible under the standard, including fire management and timber harvesting, which offers flexibility in terms of management practices. The Chilcotin project is likely to generate substantial co-benefits related to cultural, health and wellbeing, and livelihood values among First Nations participants. The Australian experience suggests that getting governance right, and building community ownership through “bottom-up” governance, is critical to the success of these programs. From the Australian model, community-based planning, like the Healthy Country Planning approach, can be a positive step to take, engaging community in goal setting for the program to guide and take ownership of its direction.

Breaking the wildfire cycle: progressive fire management can shift fire regimes and improve ecosystem condition. A case study from a large conservation reserve in northern Australia

Extensive late dry season fires in northern Australia have long been considered detrimental to biodiversity conservation, pastoral production and other cultural and landscape values. Fire management programs in these landscapes typically aim to shift the fire regime from wildfires occurring predominately in the late dry season (LDS), when they tend to be extensive and destructive, to prescribed burns in the early dry season (EDS), when fires are generally smaller and less intensive. The intent is to create heterogeneity in vegetation age classes, reduce the scale of LDS fires and, in doing so, retain long-unburnt vegetation, a critical asset for biodiversity in a flammable landscape. Boodjamulla National Park, in Queensland’s Gulf Country, experienced a cycle of large LDS wildfires every 5 years for most of its history as a pastoral property and park until a progressive EDS burning program was introduced. Although there is limited information for defining the ideal fire regime for spinifex (Triodia spp.) rangelands, this program has improved a range of spatial metrics which the Queensland Parks and Wildlife Service (QPWS) believes can only benefit biodiversity; these include decreased annual and LDS area burnt; a greater number of small burnt patches; shorter distances between recently burnt and long-unburnt spinifex; and, consequently, a greater area of long-unburnt spinifex embedded in the mosaic across the landscape. There has been an improvement in the ecological parameters of these landscapes, as well as the protection and persistence of fire-sensitive vegetation communities and species, because of the burn program.

Effects of Chemical Products on Fire Blight Suppression, and Fruit Production and Quality in Apple (Malus domestica Borkh.) cv. Golden Glory

Antibiotics are widely used in fire blight management programs, yet there are no studies that demonstrate the evaluation of their efficacy in Mexico. Therefore, the present study was conducted to investigate the effects of the active ingredients in five commercial products (Kasumin® 2L, Agrygent Plus®, Agricultural Terramycin®, Agrimicin® 100, and Actigard®) on fire blight suppression, and fruit yield and quality of apple (Malus domestica Borkh.) cv. Golden Glory. The experiment was conducted in a commercial orchard using a completely randomized block design, with six treatments: (1) Oxytetracycline [Ox], 110 mg L−1; (2) Kasugamycin [Kas], 4.7 mL L−1; (3) Oxytetracycline + Gentamicin [Ox + Gen], 48 mg L−1 + 12 mg L−1; (4) Streptomycin + Oxytetracycline [Str + Ox], 90 mg L−1 + 9 mg L−1; (5) Acibenzolar-S-methyl [ASM], 70 mg L−1; and (6) Control, only water, with four replications, and three 11-year-old trees as an experimental unit. Variables of infection including flowers, shoots and fruits, yield and fruit quality were evaluated. All treatments suppressed infection in flowers, shoots, and fruits. ASM provided the highest levels of reduction of flower and shoot infection, while Kas had the least effect on the reduction of infection in these variables. The Ox + Gen treatment had the greatest suppression of fruit infection, and the best results on fruit yield and quality, followed by Ox and ASM. This is the first study conducted to evaluate the efficacy of the active ingredients of five commercial products used for the management of fire blight in apple trees in Mexico.

Relative Inference for Paired Data: More than Meets the Eye

Relative Inference for Paired Data: More than Meets the Eye

Savanna fire management can generate enough carbon revenue to help restore Africa’s rangelands and fill protected area funding gaps

<h2>Summary</h2> Many savanna-dependent species in Africa including large herbivores and apex predators are at increasing risk of extinction. Achieving effective management of protected areas (PAs) in Africa where lions live will cost an estimated US$ >1–2 billion/year in new funding. We explore the potential for fire-management-based carbon financing programs to fill this funding gap and benefit degrading savanna ecosystems. We demonstrate how introducing early dry season fire management programs could produce potential carbon revenues (PCRs) from either a single carbon financing method (avoided emissions) or from multiple sequestration methods ranging from US$ 59.6–655.9 million/year (at US$ 5/ton) or US$ 155.0 million/year to US$ 1.7 billion/year (at US$ 13/ton). We highlight variable but significant PCRs for savanna PAs from US$ 1.5–44.4 million/year per PA. We suggest investing in fire management programs to jump-start the United Nations Decade of Ecological Restoration to help restore degraded African savannas and conserve imperiled keystone herbivores and apex predators.

Prescribed Burning Reduces Large, High-Intensity Wildfires and Emissions in the Brazilian Savanna

Brazil has recently (2014) changed from a zero-fire policy to an Integrated Fire Management (IFM) program with the active use of prescribed burning (PB) in federal Protected Areas (PA) and Indigenous Territories (IT) of the Brazilian savanna (Cerrado). PB is commonly applied in the management of fire-prone ecosystems to mitigate large, high-intensity wildfires, the associated emissions, and high fire suppression costs. However, the effectiveness of such fire management in reducing large wildfires and emissions over Brazil remains mostly unevaluated. Here, we aim to fill the gap in the scientific evidence of the PB benefits by relying on the most up-to-date, satellite-derived fire datasets of burned area (BA), fire size, duration, emissions, and intensity from 2003 to 2018. We focused on two Cerrado ITs with different sizes and hydrological regimes, Xerente and Araguaia, where IFM has been in place since 2015. To understand fire regime dynamics, we divided the study period into three phases according to the prevalent fire policy and the individual fire scars into four size classes. We considered two fire seasons: management fire season (MFS, which goes from rainy to mid-dry season, when PBs are undertaken) and wildfires season (WFS, when PBs are not performed and fires tend to grow out of control). Our results show that the implementation of the IFM program was responsible for a decrease of the areas affected by high fire recurrence in Xerente and Araguaia, when compared with the Zero Fire Phase (2008–2013). In both regions, PB effectively reduced the large wildfires occurrence, the number of medium and large scars, fire intensity, and emissions, changing the prevalent fire season from the WFS to the MFS. Such reductions are significant since WFS causes higher negative impacts on biodiversity conservation and higher greenhouse gas emissions. We conclude that the effect on wildfires can still be reduced if effective fire management policies, including PB, continue to be implemented during the coming decades.

Wildfire governance in a changing world: Insights for policy learning and policy transfer

AbstractSocieties must learn to live with, and adapt to wildfire risk. Here we examine wildfire governance and policy in British Columbia (BC), Canada over the last two decades, to examine how policy lessons are drawn from wildfire events. We focus on independent reviews and their recommendations provided, lessons learned from abroad, and whether policy and governance has changed (or not). Jurisdictional and intercultural issues in BC's wildfire response are outlined in this paper, and opportunities for innovative solutions are examined. We then present a case study of the Tsilhqot'in Fire Management program to demonstrate how Indigenous Fire Management is being revitalized as a proactive solution to wildfire. Our intent is to reveal why policy learning and transfer from Indigenous peoples is increasing in this context, and we identify how this is occurring. Barriers to implementation are outlined, and implications for wildfire governance in BC and globally are discussed.

Record-breaking wildfires in the world's largest continuous tropical wetland: Integrative fire management is urgently needed for both biodiversity and humans

In the Brazilian Pantanal, wildfire occurrence has increased, reaching record highs of over 40,000 km2 in 2020. Smoke from wildfires worsened the situation of isolated, as well as urban communities, already under an increasing toll of COVID-19.Here we review the impacts and the possible causes of the 2020 mega-fires and recommend improvements for public policies and fire management in this wetland. We calculated the amount of area burnt annually since 2003 and describe patterns in precipitation and water level measurements of the Paraguay River.Our analyses revealed that the 2020 wildfires were historically unprecedented, as 43% of the area (over 17,200 km2) had not been burnt previously in the last two decades. The extent of area affected in 2020 represents a 376% increase compared to the annual average of the area burnt annually in the last two decades, double than the value in 2019.Potential factors responsible for this increase are (i) severe drought decreased water levels, (ii) the fire corridor was located in the Paraguay River flood zone, (iii) constraints on firefighters, (iv) insufficient fire prevention strategy and agency budget reductions, and (v) recent landscape changes. Climate and land use change will further increase the frequency of these extreme events.To make fire management more efficient and cost-effective, we recommend the implementation of an Integrated Fire Management program in the Pantanal. Stakeholders should use existing traditional, local ecological, and scientific knowledge to form a collective strategy with clear, achievable, measurable goals, considering the socio-ecological context. Permanent fire brigades, including indigenous members, should conduct year-round fire management. Communities should cooperate to create a collaborative network for wildfire prevention, the location and characteristics (including flammability) of infrastructures should be (re)planned in fire-prone environments considering and managing fire-catalysed transitions, and depending on the severity of wildfires. The 2020 wildfires were tackled in an ad-hoc fashion and prioritisation of areas for urgent financial investment, management, protection, and restoration is necessary to prevent this catastrophe from happening again.

Managing fires in a changing world: Fuel and weather determine fire behavior and safety in the neotropical savannas

Fire is an important ecological disturbance, but anthropogenic wildfires increasingly threaten native ecosystems and human lives. In fire-prone ecosystems, zero-fire policies have been replaced by active fire management to reduce the risk of wildfires and improve ecological outcomes. The environmental drivers of fire behavior are widely known, but climate change and deforestation are changing their roles, making fires less predictable. Thus, reassessing the main determinants of fire behavior is preeminent to allow for safe and adaptive uses of fire in protected areas (PA). We did this research in collaboration with PA managers during the initial implementation of a pilot Integrated Fire Management (IFM) program in the Brazilian savanna. The program mainly aimed to prevent large wildfires in the late-dry season and included prescribed burns during the rainy, early- and mid-dry seasons to create vegetation patch mosaics with different fire histories. We assessed fire behavior and its environmental drivers during prescribed fires in the mid-dry season (MF) and experimental late-dry season fires (LF) (emulating wildfires). We applied Linear Models to test for differences in fire intensity, heat released, combustion factor and flame height between fire seasons and to check the influence of meteorological and fuel conditions in these parameters. LF had a significantly higher fire intensity (3508 vs. 895 kW m−1), heat released (5537 vs. 3329 kW m−2), combustion factor (90 vs. 51%) and flame height (2.5 vs. 1.9 m) than MF. Relative humidity, air temperature, wind speed and fuel load were the best predictors of fire behavior, corroborating previous research. Air temperature and relative humidity pushed the seasonal differences in fire behavior while wind speed and fuel load showed similar effects across seasons. Our results emphasize the importance of considering primarily environmental variables during fire management planning, especially in the current climate changing world where extreme events and seasonal weather fluctuations are constantly defying our knowledge about fire behavior.

Recognizing the insurance value of resilience: Evidence from a forest restoration policy in the southeastern U.S.

The long-term supply of ecosystem services is dependent on properly functioning ecosystems and their susceptibility to natural and anthropogenic disturbances such as climate change and urbanization, as they can alter ecosystem structure and function. Forest function is not static, but rather a risky asset that fluctuates and can decrease as a result of forest disturbance. Therefore, concepts such as resilience and insurance value as well effective policy formulation, management, and restoration are key to maintaining these benefits. This study estimates the insurance value that the public places on a policy that promotes restoration for increased resilience and ecosystem services using binary choice (BC) and best-worst scaling (BWS) models to estimate willingness to pay (WTP) and to vote for the restoration of longleaf pine (LLP) forests in the southeastern United States. Our BWS findings indicate that respondents seemed to only prefer programs with low risk of forest damage and lower monthly costs, while BC models show that low and moderate risk programs increased the likelihood of voting for them and that excellent wildlife habitat was also highly valued by our respondents. Positive attitudes towards the environment also positively influence voting for forest restoration programs. Findings contribute to an emerging body of literature on social-ecological systems and how the voting public conceptualizes trade-offs among ecosystem services, insurance value, and resilience. Results may help assess the use and incorporation of concepts such as resilience, ecosystem services, and insurance value in restoration, environmental, fire management, and climate change-related policy instruments and programs.

Costs and effectiveness of public and private fire management programs in the Brazilian Amazon and Cerrado

There is a noted lack of information on the effectiveness of investments in forest fire management in Brazil. Here, we quantify the budget expenditures of one private and one public fire-management program. We then compare burned areas within conservation units (CUs) and private rural properties (PPs) with and without investments in fire management in the Brazilian Amazon and Cerrado biomes. Investments in fire management in CUs total US$ 0.51 ha−1 yr−1 in the Amazon and US$ 5.32 ha−1 yr−1 in the Cerrado. Roughly, 94% of the public investment in fire management in CUs is only assigned to suppression activities, although seven CUs in Cerrado have undertaken innovative Integrated Fire Management (IFM) that includes prevention practices. Cerrado CUs with brigades for fire suppression have reduced burned area by 12%, on average, compared with CUs without brigades. Further, CUs that also included prevention practices as part of IFM reduced burned areas by an additional 6% from CUs with only fire suppression practices. Investments in both fire prevention and suppression on private lands amounted to US$ 15.89 ha−1 yr−1. We identify a reduction of 50%, on average, in burned areas after PPs joined the fire mitigation program of Aliança da Terra. In face of increasingly disruptive wildfires alongside finite financial resources, we call for the need of a mix of cost-effective private and public fire management programs with strong emphasis on prevention practices.

Role of Home Location in Fire Disaster Prevention Management

Location of home plays an important role in a fire disaster prevention management program. The objective of this management program is to determine the reduction in the number of fires by changing the home location from high to low fire potential. 21 volunteers are asked to participate in the survey. They visited 42 homes. From their experience and subjective opinion, the following results are obtained. The fatalities are reduced from 100 to 17 when the location of the home is changed from high history of low historical areas. Thus, it is concluded that statistically there is a significant reduction in the fatalities as shown below. The above conclusion is supported by the following statistical indicators. The p-score, one tailed t value, and standard deviation are 0.0%, 199.01 and 2.89 respectively.

A Burning Question: Can Savannah Fire Management Generate Enough Carbon Revenue to Help Save the Lion from Extinction?

Lions (Panthera leo) in Africa have lost nearly half their population in just the last two decades, and effective management of the protected areas (PAs) where lions live will cost an estimated USD >$1 B/year in new funding. We explore the potential for launching a fire management and habitat restoration carbon-financing program to help fill this PA management funding gap. We demonstrate how introducing early dry season fire management programs could produce potential carbon revenues (PCR) from either a single carbon-financing method (avoided emissions) or from multiple sequestration methods of USD $59.6-$655.9 M/year (at USD $5/ton) or USD $155.0 M–$1.7 B/year (at USD $13/ton). We highlight variable but significant PCR for PAs with the greatest potential for restoring lion numbers between USD $1.5–$44.4 M per PA. We suggest investing in lion-centric fire management programs to jump-start the United Nations Decade of Ecological Restoration and help preserve African lions across their range.