The open letter to Dr. Neels de Ronde and Dr. Johann Goldammer in relation to the “Regional Advanced Integrated Fire Management Course in the Optimum Use of Prescribed Fire and Regional Fire Prevention Levels”, which is planned to be held on 16-20 Sep 2019, Sabie, Mpumalanga Province, South Africa.

The open letter to Dr. Neels de Ronde and  Dr. Johann Goldammer in relation to the “Regional Advanced Integrated Fire Management Course in the Optimum Use of Prescribed Fire and Regional Fire Prevention Levels”, which is planned to be held on 16-20 Sep 2019, Sabie, Mpumalanga Province, South Africa.

Download letter as  Docx file

Dear Dr. Neels de Ronde and Dr. Johann Goldammer,

This open letter was written in the framework of the “Stop the Harmful Forms of Prescribed Burning!” international public campaign, which was started in June 2019 by the community of environmentalists from different countries.

The position of the campaign is published in the blog-website of the campaign.  It describes our vision of the entity of prescribed burning problems in the world; the probable catastrophic negative consequences of the harmful forms of prescribed burnings, which can be confidently predicted based on the character of their implementation; the objectives and the tasks of the campaign. The position can be found in the “Position of the campaign” page on the top menu of the website.

The position is also published as links on PDF documents (English and in Russian languages) in the “About” section of the “Prescribed Burning Watch” facebook group.

We kindly ask you to read this position in order to understand the concerns of our letter.

According to the objectives of the campaign and severe problems which, as we suppose, were already happened in different countries by dint of prescribed burning practice, we would like to ask questions to you. The questions devoted to the “Regional Advanced Integrated Fire Management Course in the Optimum Use of Prescribed Fire and Regional Fire Prevention Levels” or the “International Fire management Workshop” which you are going to conduct at 16-20 September 2019, Sabie, Mpumalanga Province, South Africa.  We are basing our questions on the two announcements about this event, which was made by Dr. Neels de Ronde in January and February 2019 in the “Association of Fire Management Activists” facebook group (the more details about this event was considered in Appendix of the letter).

The questions are addressed mostly to Dr. Neels de Ronde, as the organizer of the course. However, since Dr. Neels de Ronde mentioned in the group that Dr.  Johann Goldammer will participate in the course, we decided to include him in the respondents of the letter. Probably, Dr Johann Goldammer can answer or add something, because his scientific and training activity is also devoted to the prescribed burning practice and its spreading among the countries.

Our questions to Dr. Neels de Ronde are presented in the text below. In each case we explained the reason for the question. The questions themselves are marked by pink colour. In the final of the text we gave the conclusion where explain the reasons of our preoccupation and the reason of launch of the “Stop the Harmful Forms of Prescribed Burning!” international public campaign.

QUESTIONS

to Dr. Neels de Ronde

About the “Regional Advanced Integrated Fire Management Course in the Optimum Use of Prescribed Fire and Regional Fire Prevention Levels”, which is planned to be held on 16-20 September 2019, Sabie, Mpumalanga Province, South Africa.

The second full announcement of this course can be found by the links:

Web
Docx file

The first short announcement about the course can be found by the link

About your association with the scientific organization

We did not found in the open Internet sources your academic position or current association with the university or any other organization.

Q1. Could you please to inform, what academic university, institute or other organization do you officially represent in this course?

You are going to conduct a course about the practice of artificial (prescribed or controlled) burning, which has a direct impact on natural ecosystems. We suppose that this impact may produce the severe negative consequences for these ecosystems and the biodiversity of South Africa and other countries.

Q2. Are there any scientists in the fields of Ecology, Biology, Conservation biology, Forest ecology (not only Fire ecology science) associated with academic institutes or universities of South America or other countries who approved the content of your course or participated in its development? In other words, we’d like to know what scientific or commercial organization is fully responsible for this course, its content and consequences.

About the scientific questions related to the practice of prescribed burning

1. In the course announcements you emphasize that all scientific questions about the role of prescribed fire in the world have already been determined and there is no need to discuss and study them anymore. And people should do - to burn more to solve the growing problems. Here are your words about in both announcements, which can be interpreted by this way:

From the first announcement:

 “The main assumption will be that the role of fire in our regions has been determined and that the role of prescribed fire does not have to be discussed again as this has been confirmed at international level, and agreed to in the UN and the EU environment to mention a few”.

From the second announcement:

 “Before discussing these objectives, it is necessary to confirm that we accept that we do not have to re-invent the wheel. Subsequently, we do not have to hold another discussion on the role of controlled fire, as this subject has been receiving attention in numerous International Conferences, Workshops and scientific publications that have seen the light over the past few decades. It is clear that we should rather concentrate on addressing the rapidly growing challenges and need for action”.

You base this assumption on the fact that that the role of prescribed fire has been confirmed at the international level, and agreed in the United National and the European Union.

Q3. What specific confirmation (documents, decisions) of the role of prescribed fire at the international level and agreement at the United Nations and European Union do you mean?

In order to call a concept confirmed at these levels, an international convention should be created, which then is being signed and ratified (approved) by different countries. Examples of international environmental conventions are the following: The Bern Convention on Biological Diversity (1992), The Convention on Migratory Species (1979), The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (1992), The Ramsar Convention on Wetlands of International Importance (1971). Each convention has a long history of its elaboration, signature, and ratification by the countries.  Among them, there is no convention about the role of prescribed fire. So what specific documents did you have in mind talking about confirmation the role of prescribed fire at the international level and agreement at the United Nations and European Union levels? 
We ask you to give the titles of specific decisions and documents that you implied in this statement.

2.In the position of the “Stop the Harmful Forms of Prescribed Burning!” campaign we listed several very probable negative effects of the harmful forms of prescribed burning on regional and global biodiversity, condition of natural ecosystems, climate, soils, growth of wildfires. These effects can be confidently predicted based on the methodology of prescribed burnings implementation (i.e. the frequent burning on vast natural areas the inherent parts of ecosystems – a top layer of soil, plant litter, grass cover, a layer of shrubs and undergrowth) and propaganda of burning in society. We defined this form of action as intentional multiyear Ecocide because such burning means the destruction of the habitat of a huge number of species of organisms inhabiting the burnt levels of ecosystems, as well as killing of these organisms themselves. We kindly ask you to read the details in the position of the campaign (section 2.2, p.5-8).

Q4. After getting acquainted with our views, will you continue to claim that “all scientific and environmental issues have already been resolved regarding the practice of prescribed burning”?

We believe that the most important issues are just starting to arise. To raise them in society is the task of our campaign.

About the term “fuel”, its actual meaning in ecosystem and Ecocide which is conducted by the frequent burning of fuel

In the full announcement you wrote the following:

“As a result of the reality of climate change, unchecked vegetation/fuel accumulation and ignorance of fire-ecological requirements – particularly in the Mediterranean zone-biome – fire hazard levels have now reached alarming proportions in countries of Europe, Africa, the Americas and Australia particularly in the Mediterranean forests, woodlands, shrublands and grasslands”

You consider the climate change, “unchecked vegetation/fuel accumulation” and “ignorance of fire-ecological requirements” as the principal reasons which lead to an increase in the fire hazard level on all continents.

Q5. Why did you not mention the human activity, the factor which was recognized in many countries as an important or principal reason for wildfires?

Mainly, these wildfires occur due to different types of artificial (often uncontrolled and illegal) burning of vegetation by local people, which is still part of historic traditions and agricultural methods in many countries. This problem is discussed widely in many countries that suffer from the annual wildfires.

At the same time, what did you call as the “unchecked vegetation/fuel accumulation” - denotes the natural process of formation and presence in natural ecosystems their inherent parts – the top layer of soil, the plant litter, the grass cover, and the layer of shrubs and undergrowth. These are the parts of natural ecosystems, which are inhabited by a huge variety of animals, plants, fungi, and bacteria organisms and which, of course, perform important functions in natural ecosystems. These parts of the natural ecosystems have been named by the practitioners of prescribed burning by the word "fuel". Calling it by a single word, they seemed to forget about its real meaning and declared this “fuel” – the cause of wildfires, something harmful that needs to be eliminated. And by this trick, they gave themselves the right to destroy these parts of ecosystems for the purposes of wildfires mitigation and other objectives.

We wrote in the position of the “Stop the Harmful Forms of Prescribed Burning!” public campaign why the burning of “fuel” can be considered as a phenomenon of intentional Ecocide (section 2.2 (i)). In this letter we return to this issue in the Conclusion section.

Q6. Do you realize that artificial burning of the inherent parts of natural ecosystems which you call “fuel” (and conduction of burning more frequently than wildfires can occur in nature without human influence) – destroy the habitats of a huge variety of organisms living there and kill a huge number of those organisms, violate the natural processes in ecosystem (including the possibility of fast natural decomposition of dead organic matter)? Do you agree that this action can be determined as a phenomenon of Ecocide, that his action should be destructive for nature?

Q7. How the previous question will be taken into account in the course which you are going to provide in September? Did you take it into consideration in other your works related to prescribed burning? For example, did you study this problem?

About the scale of prescribed burning

You wrote about one study area the following:

“It should also be noted that the natural vegetation of the region is today as far as possible burned according to fire-ecological requirements, around and within these commercial forest units, within strict nature conservation rules”. The Escarpment region of Mpumalanga has been identified as an area where optimum prescribed burning is applied today to meet the integrated regional fire prevention requirements, based on basic fire ecological principles as well as the need for regional fire protection. This is an ongoing process to maintain this important momentum, and fire managers are still thriving for improvement”

You describe this region as an ideal for fire control. Also, that it meets the fire-ecological requirements. It means that the same measures can be implemented on a large scale everywhere. At the same time, you wrote about the complete burning of natural vegetation in the region.

Q8.What is the area of the described region where the natural vegetation is regularly totally burned (in square kilometres)? Is this method (the total, continuous, frequent burning of natural vegetation) used in South Africa and what is the scale of its usage? What kind of “strict nature conservation rules” and\or the laws of South Africa prescribe the complete destruction of natural vegetation by burning on the territory?

About the regional buffer zones, the creation of which by burning you are promoting

In the full announcement you wrote:

“These wildfires confirmed the ineffectiveness of fuel management and fire prevention measures in many regions. If we are serious in our attempts to make these preventative attempts more effective, some drastic measures will be required to achieve this in the form of applying prescribed fire to construct regional buffer zones and reduce “hotspots” of fuel accumulation to manageable levels. These fire-protective buffer zones should also be placed mainly by means of following continuous lines in the landscape and be wide enough to restrict wildfire spread effectively. Such measures should also meet fire-ecological requirements as far as is practically possible, considering all available options”.

Q9. We understood from this text, there is an intention to create in South Africa the “regional buffer zones” by prescribed burning and reduce of hotspots of fuel accumulation to manageable levels.

What width and length of the buffer zones are planned? What is the strategy of their creation which you promote? What do you mean by the “hotspots of fuel accumulation”? Considering the fact, that “fuel” means 3-4 inherent parts of natural ecosystems, your intention to destroy the hotspots of fuel looks scary, as an action very destructive for the environment.

About the open data of prescribed burning conducted in South Arica

One of the main goals of the “Stop the harmonious Forms of Prescribed Burning!” public campaign – to create possibility of public independent control and investigation of the area and frequency of prescribed burning, consequences of burning for natural lands (ecosystems condition, biodiversity) and commercial forests, as well as the impact of burning on the frequency and intensity of wildfires.  Also, our aim is to launch this study and public control in each country where prescribed burning is intensively used. For this purpose, we want to initiate the creation of the open-access summary georeferenced database of all lands passed by prescribed burning for all possible years (georeferenced contours of burnt areas, date, performer). More information about this task is given in the position of the campaign in section 5.1.

Q10. Is there such a base of the areas passed by prescribed burning or something close in South Africa?

Q11. If there is no ready summary database, is it possible to find reports about the implemented prescribed burning in South Africa - coordinates of the burnt territories and the date when the burning was implemented (reports of your work or in general).

About a notion of “fire-adapted ecosystem” and “fire-adapted species”

In the full announcement you wrote:

 “The fynbos shrubland is the main vegetation base here, and these species-rich plant communities are fire dependant in order to maintain their species biodiversity. This was determined over decades of dedicated research in the region. Likewise, the role of fire in other (minor) vegetation communities in this region was also determined, and we will discuss the reasons behind the wrong approaches to this fire-ecological misuse. The main problem in the SW and S Cape regions is that most vegetation communities are fire dependent, and these fire-ecological requirements are simply not acknowledged”.

Q12.You emphasize that most of vegetation communities in a region are fire-dependent. What scientific definition of “fire-dependent ecosystems” and “fire-dependent species” do you use? What specific characteristics should have such ecosystems and species? What criteria were used to distinguish the “fire-dependent ecosystems” and“fire-dependent species”?

Q13.The species adaptation to wildfire (as a negative factor) can be misinterpreted for the species dependence on wildfire (as a necessary factor). Give strong evidence or examples that the two concepts were not confused.

Q14.You are talking about a plant community, i.e. about an ecosystem. What criteria did you use to determine that some plant communities are dependent on fires? What is the basis of your confidence that without fires this plant community will not be able to exist?

Each ecosystem consists from many species of plants, animals, fungi, and bacteria that live at different levels and perform different functions in this ecosystem. Have you studied the effects of fire on each species and component of these communities? And did you confidently prove that all species are dependent on fire? We ask you to bring those main studies that claim your statements.

About a frequency of burning and natural frequency of wildfires

It seems obvious that if some species of plants and animals are dependent on wildfires, they have to be dependent on the natural frequency of wildfires (that is to the frequency of wildfires that occur in nature without human influence, i.e. which are launched by dry lightning).

From this follows that if your goal is to repeat the effect of wildfires in nature, then you must burn with the same frequency as the wildfires could occur in nature without human influence. Because more frequent burning – will not be natural and will cause more damage in nature than the one to which species were adapted.

In the position of the “Stop the Harmful Forms of Prescribed Burning!” campaign we justify the reason why artificial burns can be considered as Ecocide (pages 5-6, section 2.2(i)). Among others, we base our claim on the fact that most of prescribed burnings are carried out at a frequency much higher than the natural frequency of wildfires. This is easy to prove because even information about the natural frequency of wildfires for most regions of the planet where prescribed burnings are implemented has not been obtained (such studies have not been conducted). For some regions, it was studied the frequency of fires that occurred in the time of native ancient people, who intensively burned and who led to environmental disaster and the disappearance of a large number of species, including the entire megafauna on all continents. But the modern prescribed burning companies exceed even the frequency and scale of the burning of native people. In North America and Australia they burn in much larger areas and much more often than ancient people did.

Our position concords with the findings published in the scientific community. For example, Keeley et al. 2011 “Fire as an evolutionary pressure shaping plant traits” wrote:

 “No species is ‘fire adapted’ but rather is adapted to a particular fire regime, which, among other things, includes fire frequency, fire intensity and patterns of fuel consumption [2]. Species that exhibit traits that are adaptive under a particular fire regime can be threatened when that regime changes. For example, many of the species-rich Mediterranean-type climate (MTC) shrublands are resilient to periodic high-intensity crown fires at intervals of several decades or more. However, when the fire frequency increases, species can be rapidly lost”.

It means that the artificial burning with a frequency which exceeds the natural frequency of wildfires can lead to lost species in the ecosystem.

Q15. Have the investigations of the natural frequency of wildfires (i.e. the frequency of wildfires which can occur in nature without human influence) been conducted in South Africa in the regions where you burn? Title them, please. 

Q16.How often did you spend the artificial burning in natural areas? How can you prove that the frequency of your burning does not exceed the natural frequency of wildfires? (About your work or in general for South Africa)

Conclusion. Why we are concerned and ask you questions

I. We are very concerned that in the courses you intend to inspire your students that all scientific and environmental issues about the effects of prescribed burning on nature have already been solved. Probably you think so because in some countries the practice of prescribed burning and related science (Fire ecology science) has more than 50 years of history. During this time, a huge number of research papers have been written, which give the impression that everything about the role of prescribed burning was studied. However, the number of papers says nothing about the degree of knowledge of the issue.

For example, despite the huge number of papers, there are no (or quasi no) investigations devoted to obvious negative consequences of vast frequent artificial burning for the regional and global biodiversity and condition of natural ecosystems, for local and global climate change. There is no investigation of the links between the wide propaganda of prescribed burning in the countries where this practice is used and the high intensity of wildfires in these countries. There are only a small number of studies devoted to the scale of illegal burning of local people in different countries and their catastrophic effect on the environment and intensity of wildfires. There are no investigations devoted to the natural frequency of wildfires without human influence, which is necessary to know in order not to exceed the frequency of wildfires by artificial burning. There are only a small number of investigations, devoted to the catastrophic effect of long term burning of ancient people on all continents of the planet – how the ancient people changed the natural landscapes by burning, how many species of animals and ecosystems disappeared in this process. We can call a lot of other important topics that have not been touched by researchers.

However, we (the community of environmentalists and scientists of several countries, including Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Cyprus, Portugal, Germany, USA) have been introduced with the prescribed burning practice just a few months ago. Talking about this practice and its methods with each other, we saw the unawareness of its essence in most of the people (we all previously had only a general idea that this is just a method of protecting forests from fires).

After getting acquainted with this practice, we were very surprised and horrified by its methods and their very probable catastrophic negative consequences for biodiversity, condition of natural ecosystems, climate, soils, intensity of wildfires, and health of people. For this reason, we have launched a public international campaign “Stop the Harmful Forms of Prescribed Burning!”.

During these 50 years of the development of Fire ecology science, a strange thing had happened. From the findings of the Fire ecology science (which is the collection and analysis of information on the role of wildfires in natural ecosystems), people suddenly concluded that they have the RIGHT and even the OBLIGATION to invade in natural lands and implement of artificial burning there on vast areas destroying the inherent parts of natural ecosystems; to burn as often as they want (and almost always much more often than wildfires occur in nature without human influence). That is, the people had allowed themselves to conduct the intentional long-term ECOCIDE. From this concept, the practice of prescribed burning in its modern form gradually formed.

We are studying how this can happen? Why these destructive actions were not stopped by anyone?  Our questions to you have the purpose to advance and in this understanding.

II. We are very concerned that you are actively providing the objective to increase the prescribed burning practice in natural territories on all continents and countries. There are your words (from the full course announcement) which can be interpreted by this way:

 “It is clear that we should rather concentrate on addressing the rapidly growing challenges and need for action”. “This increase in wildfires clearly points to a need to include extrapolation of the methodology we will cover during the course, to other regions in South Africa and to other countries and continents outside this country. Subsequently, it was already reported that extreme increases in the occurrence and size of disastrous wildfires now also are a problem at Global levels”

We believe that the intention to disseminate these methods and to use them in practice is extremely dangerous. It can cause great damage to the wild natural ecosystems and biodiversity of South Africa and other countries. Also, the propaganda of prescribed burning can increase wildfires everywhere.  This follows from the negative effects of prescribed burning which we can confidently predict based on the methods of their implementation (we more in the position of the campaign, sections 2.2 (i, ii, iii)). We formulated our concerns on the questions addressed to you.

We believe that the frequent burning of parts of natural ecosystems (which the practitioners of prescribed burning call by the word “fuel”) is Ecocide because it leads to the destruction of the habitat of a huge variety of species that inhabit these parts of ecosystems, and to the death of these organisms themselves. The real consequences of this practice are hard to imagine. This is a question for study in all countries where intensive prescribed burning was carried out, including South Africa, Australia, USA, Canada, several European countries.

III. We’d like to note that if a volcano erupts and floods the natural areas by lava or a large wildfire starts and burn the forest killing their animals, we cannot blame the volcano or the wildfire in ecocide or any other crime against nature because they are not natural and legal persons who responsible in our society for their actions. But if the burning and destruction of the natural environment are carried out by a person or a company - we can blame them using the existent codes of laws. Even if they burn out with the same frequency, which wildfires occur in nature by natural reasons without human influence (i.e. by dry lightning). But here the situation is aggravated by the fact that the practitioners of prescribed burning usually or always implement artificial burning much more often than wildfires can occur in nature without human influence. That is, the burning of “fuel” can be defined as intentional Ecocide, which is carried out even without the desire to repeat a natural process of wildfires.

Currently, Ecocide is recognized as a criminal offense only in 10 countries - Armenia, Georgia, Ukraine, Belarus, Ecuador, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, and Vietnam. In 2010 and 2013, the attempts to give the concept of Ecocide the status of international crime and a criminal offense in the United Nations and the European Union were made. Both attempts failed.

However, the European countries, the United States, South Africa, Canada, Australia have their own environmental legislation that protects biodiversity and the environment from the negative anthropogenic impact. There is also the International Bern Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD,1992), which, among other countries, was ratified by South Africa.

We suppose that the methods of artificial burning which you implemented and which you are going to propose on the course and realize in the future can violate the environmental legislation of South Africa as well as the international agreements devoted to biodiversity conservation.

We will study more this question with the help of lawyers. But we already see that the harmful forms of prescribed burning practice in all countries  (including the methods of artificial burning which you implemented in South Africa and which you are going to propose on the course and realize in the future) may be a serious violation of the Precautionary principle or Precautionary approach of the International Bern Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD, 1992). More information about the Precautionary principle of CBD can be found, for example,  – here). Also, the Precautionary principle of South African environmental legislation can be applied in this case (more details – here).

We kindly ask you to answer these questions and try to prove to us and to the whole society that your goals do not harm the natural ecosystems and biodiversity. That is – to answer with arguments and evidence on all issues. We also ask you to continue the dialogue in the future. In this letter, we have summarized only a part of our arguments against the prescribed burning practice.

We know that you have a lot of publications about the role of prescribed burning which relates to part of our questions. However, we ask you to answer the questions in your own words (not only by links to your or someone else's publications) for the following reasons:

The scientific papers in journals consider your scientific results and positions in science. That is, they describe the analysis and processing of information (not practical actions). The main part of them was written a relatively long time ago.  They do not cover all of our questions.
Our questions are focused on the actual practical actions on the ground that you have implemented, are doing now and plan to do in the future. Also, they devote to the practical course in September 2019, on which you are going to spread the practical methods of prescribed burning to South Africa and other countries. It is important for us to know the actual information about the real impact on the natural ecosystems that you may conduct by burning, not just your scientific published results and opinions, which are related to our questions.

But if you have the ready reports about your practical burning works – we can take it instead of answer on some questions.

We publish the letter in the open form on the website of the campaign for the reason that we do not ask questions to satisfy our personal curiosity. We would like to inform the whole society, the people of the whole planet. We express not only personal position, but the position of the community, which began to work for the purposes of the “Stop the harmonious Forms of Prescribed Burning!” public campaign.
Your answers will also be published on the website.

The text of the open letter and your answers will be used in other steps of the campaign. We plan to send it to the responsible governmental agencies of South Africa, to the environmental organizations of South Africa, the Committee of the Bern Convention (which South Africa ratified and which it may violate due to the mass use of prescribed burning), to the United Nation and the European Union environmental commissions. In order to give them this information and ask to investigate it. For this reason, your complete answers are important. They may help to present all issues in a manner that will be more applicable to you.

Regards,

The working group of the 

“Stop the Harmful Forms of Prescribed Burning!” 

public campaign

APPENDIX

Information about the course

The first announcement about this course (which was titled at first as the “International Fire management Workshop”) was done 8.01.2019 by Mr. Dr.Neels de Ronde in the “Association of Fire Management Activists” facebook group:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/234543706747903/permalink/938164333052500/

The second and full announcement about this course was done in the same group later. It was called “Regional Advanced Integrated Fire Management Course in the Optimum Use of Prescribed Fire and Regional Fire Prevention Levels”. This announcement was deleted from the materials of the group (by a technical error), but was repeated by Ed Komarek (admin of the “Association of Fire Management Activists” facebook group and a great enthusiast of prescribed burning practice) in his blog “Fire in Nature”, where he published it:
https://fireinnature.weebly.com/fire-management-course.html?fbclid=IwAR0vlr8q3-t2ofL29kN7kKgGNN0My8EFpxLHIUg-OKba693EuLWDQxkrhFQ

The DOCX file of the second and full announcement of this course can be also found by this LINK

Information about the authors of the course and recipients of our letter

Dr. Neels de Ronde

In the open internet sources we did not find information about the professional association of Dr. Neels de Ronde with any university or institute.

He studied at the University of Stellenbosch, South Africa. His origin – Amsterdam, Netherlands.  Currently  - self-employed (information was taken from facebook profile).

As he describes himself at art source:

A specialist in prescribed burning, wildland fire management and other fire-related subjects, and have been researching these fields in natural as well as in man-made ecosystems (such as industrial man-made timber plantations)in Africa and in Europe (information from art source).

Johann Goldammer

Global Fire Monitoring Center (GFMC)/Fire Ecology Research Group, Max Planck Institute for Chemistry,c/o Freiburg University, Georges-Koehler-Allee 75, D-79110 Freiburg, Germany; johann.goldammer@fire.uni-freiburg.de

(Information was taken from the paper)

A professor at the Albert Ludwigs University of Freiburg, Department of Forest and Environmental Sciences. The University hosts the Global Fire Monitoring Center (GFMC), a body which is instrumental in facilitating communication between national and regional forest fire organizations and NGOs. He co-convenes the IGBP-IGAC-BIBEX programme and serves as leader of the UN-FAO/ECE/ILO Team of Specialists on Forest Fire and coordinator of the Wildland Fire Advisory Group and the Global Wildland Fire Network of the UN International Strategy for Disaster Reduction (ISDR). He is also member of the ISDR Interagency Task Force for Disaster Reduction. Goldammer has ongoing research concerns on all continents since the mid-1970s and was involved in designing, preparing and partially implementing international and interdisciplinary research campaigns and fire experiments. A series of international conferences organized by the group have produced several monographs on regional and global fire ecology.

(Information was taken from the Wikipedia )

Received answers 

Dr. Neels de Ronde gave the following short answers on this open letter in the “European Wildland Firefighter” facebook (closed) group (the screenshots of both answers are presented below).

"This course was cancelled as a result of my health"

and

“All invited were advised. Course was cancelled thus I will not answer your questions”.