The Russian and Belarus attitude towards fire activity is dominated by a strong belief in the ability to suppress fires. However, the BalticFire project stresses, there are strong indications that climate change will lead to considerably higher levels of fire activity and that today’s capacity to suppress fires will not be enough. Meanwhile, the Russian national forest industry is transforming into a highly effective wood production industry. The project suggests that preventive and long-term mitigation strategies should be put in place to address the risks to timber production. The goal of the project is to understand how historical and future climate will affect the dynamics of fire activities in the Baltic Sea region.
The project will extend the scope of the work in the EU project to the eastern parts of the Northern European boreal region to share expertise and data across the borders. It will create a platform for research cooperation and analyses in the field of forest susceptibility to extreme climate events. The activities will focus on sharing research data, to identify regime shifts in the historical fire activity in the Baltic Sea region and develop long-term projections of fire hazards, among other things.