Our planet is burning…

The record number of fires detected daily across the world is 187,114.

This record was beaten on September 09, 2020 with 136,680, or 50,000 more!

These fires are detected and monitored using NASA satellites. We can observe that unfortunately all continents are affected.

The European Commission has therefore decided to help coordinate aid to assist the most seriously affected countries.

During the summer of 2021, fires multiplied in Europe and around the world:

Greece: this one was hit by the worst heat wave in three decades, on the island of Euboea 200km from Athens, firefighters fought for more than a week as the flames surrounded the villages one after the other.

Balkans: in Albania and North Macedonia, dozens of fires have killed several people.

Turkey: water bombers had been sent to try to stop the 180 simultaneous fires ravaging forests, agricultural land and inhabited areas on the coasts. The country has suffered the worst wave of fires in a decade.

Italy: Firefighters carried out 37,407 interventions for fires, 16,000 more than the previous year.

Algeria: temperatures do not drop below 40°C, around fifty fire starts had been counted in Kabylie, a heavily wooded and densely populated mountainous region, about a hundred kilometers east of Algiers. At least 40 people lost their lives.

Siberia: according to the Federal Forest Protection Agency, 8.68 million hectares of forests have gone up in smoke. The American space agency, NASA, had announced that the smoke from the fires in Yakutia had “traversed more than 3,000 km to reach the North Pole, which was a first in documented history.

California: the gigantic “Dixie fire” which has ravaged California since July 2021 has become the second largest recorded fire in the history of the State. The blaze exceeded the area of ​​the city of Los Angeles. Nearly 200,000 hectares had burned in less than a month.

Amazonia: In the first half of 2021, deforestation in the Amazon increased by 17% compared to the first half of 2020. As the dry season opened in Brazil, the number of fires exceeded that of the previous year at the same period.

Man cannot stand still and watch the green lungs that keep him alive disappear.

As the IPCC report on climate change makes very clear, the 1.5°C target set by the Paris Agreement is slipping away.

We know the problem; we know the solutions – now is the time to put them into practice.

By fighting together, we can help save the world’s forests, which are essential to our survival, and demand policies that are finally up to the challenge facing us at COP26.