The UK Legal Plans in Confronting Climate Change and Wildfires

Abstract

The UK is the only country in the world that has formally established a legislative framework for responding to the effects of climate change. Academic networks and regional and national wildfire forums have contributed to the accumulation of wildfire knowledge. The recognition of the need for centralised disaster preparedness and response to climate change did not result in a national policy response to climate change until much later. Since 2009, statistics on flames have allowed it to collect geographical evidence of wildfires across the country. The government's responsibilities are dispersed throughout the risk chain, making it difficult to coordinate actions among different sectors in response to wildfires. Several stakeholders, including the Forestry Commission, developed innovative and effective adaptive land management practices to make the UK's woods more fire resistant. This has also been made possible by the rise of grassroots participatory solutions. Now, a well-coordinated strategy is required to develop best practices and further our understanding of the role of fire in the natural world. In a worldwide context, any fire that does not include structures and occurs in a wilderness area is referred to as a wildfire, except for controlled burns (i.e. fires burned to reduce fuel loads for dangerous fire prevention or ecological management). In the UK, just 2.6 million square kilometres of land are occupied by cities and towns. Over 65% of the land is used for agricultural uses such as crops, grazing and grassland, while 13% of the land, over 3 million hectares, is used for forestry. It is common for fires to break out in what is known as the ‘rural-urban interface’, which is the transition zone between rural and urban settings. The term ‘wildland-urban interface’, frequently used in other regions of the world, seems improper to employ in a place where there are no true wilderness areas. This dissertation consists of an introduction, three chapters, and recommendations for further improvements that may be adopted by the UK Government.