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Nepal Forest Fire Management Chapter (NFMC)
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About us: What is NFMC?
It is an autonomous, non-profit, non-governmental organization registered in Nepal government and affiliated with Social Welfare Council Nepal in 2008. It has been established in accordance with the works and objectives of UN-ISDR Wildland Fire Advisory Group (WFAG) / the Global Wildland Fire Network (GWFN) and its secretariat the Global Fire Monitoring Center (GFMC) and the Regional South Asia Wildland Fire Network (RSAWFN).
Our goal is to institutionalize wildland fire management activities for sustainable forest resource management in the country.
Background
Nepal has diverse ecosystems, socio-economic and cultural settings and vegetation types resulting from a wide range of land-use systems and climatic conditions, consequently having diverse fire regimes and vulnerabilities.
Fire is used by the rural population as a traditional tool for clearing and managing agricultural and pasture lands. Most of these fires are uncontrolled and have the potential to cause major damages. Consequences of uncontrolled fires in country, inter alia, lead serious degradation of forests, ecological changes, as well as deterioration of social and economical conditions in some land-use systems and natural vegetation types.
However, not all fires are destructive and fire management can be an essential part in ecosystem management.
There is a lack of existing national capability in fire research and management, including monitoring, early warning and ecological and socio-economic impact assessment, and facilitating international cooperation in fire management.
There is increasing interest in Community-Based Fire Management (CBFiM) and the need for institutional and technological capability development at all levels.
There is a high expectation from sustainable management of vegetation cover, which provides goods and services including non-timber forest products and recreation, maintain biological diversity, mitigates the consequences of climate change, conserves watersheds, improves air quality and helps to reduce poverty through livelihood support to rural populations.
And need to develop synergies through coordinated and collective action to deal with the most important problems related to fire management at local and national levels.
For further contributions from the NFMC see materials on the International Fire Management Conferences (IWFC):
NFMC website:
