An Asian pea-souper: KUALA LUMPUR FROM the observation platform of Kuala Lumpur’s telecoms tower, you can see on a clear day, if not for ever, then at least to the sea. But clear days are not expected for some weeks. At present, even the nearby twin towers of the world’s tallest office block emerge only as murky phantoms from a brownish fog. The city, like most of South-East Asia, is shrouded in a poisonous smog that stings the eyes, rasps the lungs and sinks the spirits. It is an ecological disaster of huge dimensions and one that has left environmentalists gasping at the political, legal and diplomatic failures that allowed it to happen. Kuala Lumpur is comparatively lightly affected. The "air-pollutants index" (API) there this week hovered between 100 and 200. In Kuching, the capital of Malaysia’s Sarawak state, it reached 839. The government declared a state of emergency in Sarawak when it passed 500, the level deemed to be seriously harmful to health. Kuching became a ghost town, with visibility reduced to a few yards. Schools and many offices closed, and aircraft were unable to land. There was even talk of evacuating Sarawak’s 2m people. But nobody could think where to. Other places in Borneo and Sumatra are even worse affected. They are closer to the source of the smoke—forest fires burning out of control in Indonesia, across an area said to be as big as the Malaysian peninsula itself. But the smog contains more than just wood smoke. It serves as a kind of atmospheric lid to contain all the lead, carbon monoxide, sulphur dioxide and particulates that the industrialising and motorising countries of the region pump relentlessly into the air. In Malaysia, motorists have been urged to share cars; builders and factory owners have been told to stop work when the API reaches 250; the wearing of surgical masks is recommended. On September 24th, the World Health Organisation gave warning of respiratory and heart ailments unless the smog cleared soon. On top of that are the costs of the disaster, which go far beyond the direct expense of fighting the fires or seeding clouds with dry ice or saline solution to induce rain. The World Bank has offered its help. America and Britain have advised visitors to the area to limit the time they spend outdoors. For South-East Asian economies, already in the grip of a currency crisis, the smog is a further depressant. Alarmingly, it has happened before, notably in 1994, although not on such a scale. Indonesia used to blame slash-and-burn farmers, who are often cited as culprits for ecological damage by regional governments anxious to justify the industrial destruction of forests. Now it is acknowledged that most of the fires were lit to clear land for plantations to produce palm oil or paper and pulp. Unfavourable winds and a prolonged drought, blamed in part on the El Niño effect, have kept them alight, igniting even the peaty soil in some places. For environmentalists, the smog highlights several weaknesses in the region’s societies. Many of the plantation owners are breaking the law; but enforcement is weak and susceptible to bribery and political influence. Political systems are often too rigid or undeveloped for large expressions of popular feeling that might make such widespread vandalism impracticable. An Indonesian environmental group, WALHI, has said it will try to sue the plantation owners in the courts. But that may not lead to much. In Malaysia, a demonstration in Kuala Lumpur on September 21st to protest at government inaction attracted just a few dozen activists. That the region should have to put up with smog again is also a failure for its diplomacy. Six members of the regional club, the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN), are affected: Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei, Thailand and the Philippines. Yet, much as ASEAN likes to boast of its success in keeping relations among its members smooth, its environmental committee has been powerless. When environment ministers met in Indonesia this month, they had to move their meeting-place to escape the pollution. Indonesia’s President Suharto addressed them, and said sorry for the smog. An apology seems inadequate. But ASEAN likes to boast of its gentle consensual ways, working by mutual encouragement rather than sanction. Malaysia, some of whose companies are investors in the offending plantations, is now helping to put the fires out. Even so, the smog is likely to worsen, and may linger until late November, unless the annual monsoon rains come early. In the meantime, governments seem keen not to allow dirty air to foul their relations with each other, or to alarm their people too much. So they prefer to call it a "haze", which sounds much more benign than smog or pollution. Whatever you call it, it takes the breath away. © Copyright 1997 The Economist Newspaper Limited. All Rights Reserved
