The primary cause of the haze covering Singapore has been caused by illegal agricultural fires, set off by farmers taking advantage of Indonesia’s dry season. The burning tends to peak from July to October, due to farmers taking advantage of the weather conditions. Farmers will use what is called the slash-and-burn method, which entails the clearing of forests with any left over vegetation being burned. Typically this method is used to clear land for palm oil and paper plantations. The fires set to clear any last bits of the remaining forests wind up spiralling out of control, causing much of Indonesia’s protected forests to burn and produce the transboundary haze, which has now spread across Malaysia, Singapore, and parts of Thailand and the Philippines. The main concern is the hazes extreme deterioration of these regions air quality and the infringement on the citizens rights protected in the Asean Human Rights Declaration (AHRD). In Malaysia alone, the haze has reached a 208 on the API (Air Pollution Index) which is over 100 over what is considered to be healthy. However, Indonesia is feeling the highest levels of impact. 301-500 on the API is considered to be hazardous; this Sunday Indonesia’s API was 2000. Now, representatives from the Asean Intergovernmental Commission on Human Rights from these regions have come together in an attempt to mitigate the haze, and call for a plan that may help prevent it from happening in the future. They called for the Asean Agreement on Transboundary Haze Pollution (AATHP), which was created in 2002 as a result of the fires negative effects on Asean citizens, to be enforced more strictly in today’s times. Many at this conference also expressed their concern regarding the infringement of their citizens’ rights to the highest attainable standard of health and an adequate standard of living which is stated in the AHRD. I believe that if these regions choose to disregard the ATTHP and pollution levels continue to rise, public institutions such as schools, libraries, public transportation, etc, will be forced to shut down, further infringing on their citizens rights.
