To learn more about burning practices and trends, the burning regimes study surveyed people‟s perceptions of fire. Informants offered a number of observations.
First, local inhabitants perceive three distinct periods of burning during the dry season. In response to the question “when are these fires set?” informants indicated that fires are set (1) either “at the beginning of the dry season when grasses are dry and fire can be ignited” or the “harvest period” (mid-October to late-December); (2) “during the harmattan period when the wind blows strongly” or “after farmers have stocked harvest in granaries and it is windy” (January-February); and (3) “in the late dry season” or “toward the end of the dry season” (March-April) (Table 3.3).
Table 3.3. Terms used by household heads to distinguish the three burning periods
Second, a common view is that there is a shift in biomass burning from the middle and late dry season to the early dry season and that fires set at the beginning of the dry season are not that destructive. Most people deem burning to be beneficial such as providing cattle and bush animals with nourishing grasses, removing shelters of cattle diseases, clearing the landscape for the purpose of visibility, and to provide some
At the beginning of the dry season when grasses are dry and fire can be ignited
After last rains people start setting fire around mid-October Early dry Sometimes before the end of harvest
season period From November 15
December
In the middle of the dry season
After harvests, in the middle of the dry season
Middle dry During the harmattan period when the wind blows strongly season period January because this zone is a woody vegetation
It is in February that the zone burn because it is a forest, difficult to burn
January-February
Late dry In the late dry season season period March-April
nutrients to crops and the natural vegetation. In contrast to the early dry season fires, the middle dry season burning is considered to be more destructive: these intense fires burn more available dry fodder that cattle can graze during the dry season; middle dry season burns negatively affect vegetation growth because plant and soil water reserves are more likely to evaporate due to the intense heat. Informants also equate middle dry season burning with sicknesses (e.g. colds, meningitis, respiratory problems) because the air is much polluted with dust, smoke, and particulate matter from vegetation burning.
Third, when asked to describe and to compare the bush fires of the period when they were young to the current ones, all the informants declared that biomass burning was very intense and fire flames were very tall. According to them, fires were in general set in the middle dry season or in the late dry season. Thus, 40 years ago, a single fire ignited in the bush could burn during several continuous days and nights, large areas on several kilometers. The severity of fire is attributed to the existence of a very dry, tall, thick, and much grassy landscape. Local inhabitants also declared that current bush fires are set early in the dry season and that these fires do not burn large areas. Bush fires are said to be small in size and more frequent compared to the 1970s, refashioning the landscape into burned and unburned patches.
Local perceptions of trends in biomass burning are that bush fires are in general decreasing in intensity and area in the region. This decline is attributed to several factors. First, the expansion in cultivated area and more permanent farms has led to less burning associated with reduced fallowing. Second, the growth in numbers of cattle has led to increased grazing pressure and less grassy biomass likely to burn. The year 1970 marks an important turning point in livestock raising in northern Côte d‟Ivoire. That year, large number FulBe pastoralists from Mali and Burkina Faso crossed in to Côte d‟Ivoire in search of better pastures. The drought of the late 1960s effectively pushed the FulBe and their herds into the more humid sudanian savanna. In 1974, the Ivorian government established a livestock development agency (SODEPRA) to provide services to FulBe cattle in the region. The combination of these push and pull factors led to a dramatic increase in cattle grazing in the northern savanna region (Bassett 1985; Bassett and Turner 2008). Third, the expansion of cashew and mango orchards has entailed burning where there are orchards (Fig.3.5).
“coffee trees of the north” in the 1950s for the three fold reasons of protecting the soil, improving nutrition, and for generating additional income in commodity markets. The total cultivated areas in cashews were 820 hectares in 1965 and 1,750 hectares in 1970 in the north. Different experiences of commercialization of orchards failed and tree planting became less attractive to farmers (Filleron 1995). In the 1990s, the cotton price declined on the international market and negatively affected West African cotton producers. Peasants diversified their sources of income by re-investing in cashew and mango orchards. Since then, the cultivated area in cashew and mangoes has increased every year in the north in general and especially in Katiali region (Bassett and Koné 2008).
Fig. 3.5. Cashew plantation, cotton field, and cattle grazing a harvested field
In short, the findings reveal that over the period 1970-2009, the number of people living in the village increased while the geographical area and intensity of biomass burning declined in the Katiali region. Main causes of the decline of biomass burning are reduced grass biomass from increased grazing, the expansion of mango and cashew orchards, a larger area under cultivation, early burning, and more firebreaks throughout the landscape. These findings contradict the prevailing perceptions and assumptions in the climate change literature. In the following section, the prevailing burning regimes in the region are extensively analyzed.