A climate advocacy group has urged Indonesia’s Prabowo government to make fossil fuel companies pay for wildfire losses as fires spread across the country.
350.org Indonesia called on the government to implement a planned windfall tax on coal companies’ profits and use the revenue to support communities affected by wildfires.
It said that climate change, not El Niño alone, is worsening conditions that fuel the blazes.
The appeal came as firefighters battled a blaze for an eighth day at Bromo Tengger Semeru National Park in East Java, where more than 500 hectares had burned, and flames were advancing toward residential areas.
“In fighting these fires and rebuilding what’s lost, it shouldn’t be ordinary Indonesians footing the bill. Fossil fuel companies driving this crisis must pay for the damage they’ve caused,” said Sisilia Nurmala Dewi, 350.org Indonesia country manager.
“Our leaders already have the power to make polluters pay – the only thing missing is the will to act on it,” she added.
The East Java disaster mitigation agency said two water-bombing helicopters, fire trucks and drones equipped with sprinklers were assisting forest rangers and soldiers fighting the Bromo blaze.
By Aug. 10, “the fire has spread toward residential areas” in the Dingklik Valley area of the park, agency official Satriyo Nurseno said.
Authorities closed Bromo Tengger Semeru National Park, a major tourist destination, as firefighters struggled to contain the blaze.
More than 107,000 hectares of land burned across Indonesia during the first half of 2026, more than twice the area destroyed by wildfires in 2023.
Indonesia’s weather agency, BMKG, has forecast a long and intense dry season this year, with a high risk of drought and wildfires partly because of El Niño.
350.org said El Niño alone does not explain the worsening fire conditions, pointing to rising temperatures as a factor intensifying extreme weather.
Indonesia recorded an average temperature of 27 degrees Celsius in July, above the 26.2 C average and the highest for the month since 1991, according to figures cited by the group.
“El Niño didn’t act alone — the climate crisis is what turned our forests into tinder. Every year, the planet gets hotter, communities lose more homes, and people breathe more toxic air,” Dewi said.
“Unless we extinguish the problem of burning fossil fuels, forest fires will continue to destroy land and lives.”
The group also urged the government to establish a reliable and well-governed early warning system for communities at risk, noting that El Niño had been forecast since March.
It said firefighting must be matched by recovery assistance for affected communities, with the costs borne by fossil fuel companies rather than ordinary taxpayers.
At Bromo, Forestry Minister Raja Juli Antoni said cloud-seeding operations could not be carried out for several days because of a lack of clouds.
Cloud seeding involves dispersing particles such as silver iodide and salt into clouds in an effort to produce rainfall. – with reports from Agence France-Presse
