Nature repairs itself!

Gökay BAŞCAN

Another summer season has passed, marked by forest fires that left the AKP a mere bystander and citizens abandoned. The ruling party, which has turned a deaf ear to scientists in the fight against forest fires, is attempting to ingratiate itself with the public with post-fire afforestation campaigns. Despite experts' warnings against planting trees, especially pine trees, in burned areas, sapling planting campaigns are being organized.

Prof. Dr. Doğanay Tolunay, a faculty member at Istanbul Cerrahpaşa University's Faculty of Forestry, said, "As experts, we feel like we're experiencing déjà vu" regarding these calls and campaigns held every year.

Prof. Dr. Tolunay stated that 2025, with its already nearly 70,000 hectares of forested land, is among the top five years with the most forest fires. "While the fires continued, discussions were being conducted via airplanes and helicopters," he said. "After the fires, the issue of reforestation of the burned forests became a hot topic. Public concern that the burned forests would be given over to development, mining companies, and hotels led to pressure to reforest the burned forests, and afforestation campaigns were launched immediately. The red pine forests of the Mediterranean, with their hot and dry climate, were blamed, as if the red pines, not the people, were the ones starting the fires."

Responding to claims that burned areas will be opened for development, Tolunay said, “First of all, there's only one example of hotels being built in burned forests. This single example makes the public think that forests are being burned for hotel construction. However, there's no need to burn down a forest to build a hotel, open a mine, lay a road or power line, or build an energy facility. In fact, in our country, an area nearly twice as large as the forests burned each year is deforested due to the permits issued for such facilities.”

JUST PROTECT THE SPACE

Speaking about burned areas, Tolunay said, “Scientifically, the necessary actions should be determined after assessing the severity of the fire in burned forests, such as tree species and soil characteristics. For example, if the fire is not too severe, the cones on red pine trees will not burn. The cones that open after the fire will fall into the ash and germinate after autumn rains. If the trees lack sufficient cones or have burned, pre-stored seeds are scattered on the burned areas in the autumn. Afforestation should be considered in the spring of the following year if, despite all this, the burned forests fail to produce saplings. In maquis forests, even these measures are unnecessary. Maquis plants begin to sprout roots within a few weeks after the fire.”

Tolunay emphasized that it is necessary to wait for the grass shed from burned trees to seed, saying, “Afforestation when very large areas are burned is also a problem. Because when more forests are burned than anticipated, there may not be enough saplings in nurseries. According to 2024 data, approximately 132 million saplings were produced in forest nurseries. The area that can be afforested using all these saplings is approximately 80,000 hectares. Since the burned area is approximately 70,000 hectares, the number of saplings may be sufficient. However, the saplings to be planted must be species that grow naturally in that region, and even the seeds from which the saplings are produced must have been collected from that region. Planting saplings in a burned area is not enough. The saplings can survive there for 50-60 years without any maintenance. Because when reforesting burned forests, the future climate must also be taken into account. Moreover, during the afforestation of burned forests, the soil becomes vulnerable to erosion due to the processing of the soil with large construction equipment and the uprooting of burned trees. The germination of the seeds shed from burned trees "It goes without saying that waiting or planting seeds is a much cheaper method. When reforestation is carried out with species unsuitable for the climate and soil characteristics of burned forests, many of these saplings will wither the following year," he said.

Speaking about the recent debates about the wrongdoing of afforestation in some regions, Tolunay said: "And photos taken in the 1920s, particularly after the Gallipoli fires, have brought to light the fact that there was no forest in that region. This is looking at the past through today's lens. The Gallipoli Campaign lasted almost a year and a half. In this region, where artillery shells are still emerging from the ground, the question of where the fuel for soldiers' needs like heating and cooking was sourced was never raised. Whether the intense artillery fires caused forest fires was never considered. Forest fires are a problem not just in our country, but worldwide. The primary cause of fires is humans, and the increasingly severe climate change is causing human-started fires to quickly escalate into mega-fires. The solution to these mega-fires is not species change, but the establishment of fire-resistant forests. To this end, controlled fires along roadsides and residential areas before the fire season must be carried out, flammable materials must be burned, trees must be pruned, and dense forests must be thinned."