The peatlands, which have been reclaimed as a result of the drainage of marshes and swamps, risk reverting to their former state. The lack of an irrigation and drainage system, as well as fires set by farmers believing that they increase production, have led to the degradation of an area over 20,000 hectares, most of which is located in the municipalities of Maliq, Lezhë, and Divjakë. The flames spread dangerous particles into the atmosphere, endangering the health of the residents.
Author: Rolandi Beqiraj
Thousands of hectares of agricultural, peaty land in Albania are at risk of being scorched by fires. The largest areas of peatland, spanning 9,000 hectares, are located in the municipalities of Maliq, Lezhë, and Divjakë, but none of them have functional irrigation and drainage systems, which are the only way to mitigate the destructive effects of the fires that affect the economy, the environment, and the health of the population.
Marshes and swamps, also spread across the districts of Shkodra, Dibra, Fier, and Gjirokastra, were converted into agricultural land during the dictatorship through the process of reclamation, increasing the country’s arable land fund by about 21,000 hectares.
Peatlands, originating from decomposed water-loving vegetation, have a high yield potential but during summer, in the absence of water, peat layers tend to self-ignite. The fire, which can last several months, reduces the soil level by 3-5 cm every year.
As if self-burning weren’t enough, farmers also use fire as a method of clearing, believing that it enhances productivity.
Sulejman Qemalaj from the village of Drithas in Maliq says he owns 20 hectares of land, 5 of which are peatlands. The farmer admits that he burns the peatland plots every year.
“What remains after harvesting wheat and corn, I burn. We all do this because it makes the land more fertile and prepares it for the next planting season. We have heard that burning impoverishes the soil, but we do not believe it,” says Qemalaj.
Agricultural experts consider the burning of lands harmful and with long-term consequences. According to them, peatlands lose their nutrients for plants and their level decreases due to burning. Agriculture expert Robert Damo says that in an undisturbed peatland, organic matter is at 40.92%, while in a burned peatland it decreases to 1.9%.
Shkëlqim Myslymi, a resident of the village of Sheqeras in Maliq, owns 28 hectares of land, 4 of which are peatlands. He mentions that he cultivates wheat and corn, but over the years, the production has almost halved, and his income has decreased.
“In 1 hectare planted with corn, I used to harvest 8 quintals, but this year I only got 4 quintals. If we deduct the costs, we can earn 5 thousand lek per hectare. Almost the same amount is earned from wheat,” he says.
The farmer explains that he burns the land after harvesting, but according to him, the decrease in yield does not come from the fire. This happens due to the lack of irrigation and low-quality chemical fertilizers, which are sold in agricultural pharmacies.
Acknowledging the issue posed by burning plant residues in peatlands, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, in response to requests for information, stated that in burned lands, yields decrease by 25-35%. Despite claims by the Ministry that awareness campaigns have been undertaken to educate farmers, evidently, they have not yielded results, as the lands continue to burn.
The Municipality of Maliq has the largest area of peatlands in the country, around 5,300 hectares. Due to self-burning and fires set by farmers after harvesting, almost 2,000 hectares are burned. The lowering of the land level due to fires is followed by flooding of this surface during autumn and winter.
“After the parcel burns, a hole remains because the land level decreases, and when it rains, it floods. We don’t cultivate it for 3-4 years because nothing grows,” says farmer Shkëlqim Myslymi. Expert Damo, through measurements, has concluded that only 10 cm remain from the burning of a 50 cm layer of peat.
“Fires in peatlands are common. Due to the lack of management measures from municipalities, agricultural land is degrading, reducing the cultivable surface,” says Damo. In some areas in the field of Maliq, the land has dropped by up to 5 meters, turning them into swamps.
Expert Damo, who has studied peatlands for over two decades, says cultivation is impossible on a surface of 500 hectares in the Maliq field, while on a surface of 1,600 hectares burned over the years, cultivation is problematic to the extent of 15-30%. The expert has calculated the economic damage on a surface of 1,000 hectares, which is not cultivated due to fires and floods.
“If this land area were cultivated with wheat, with a yield of 5,000 kg/ha and a price of 25 lek/kg, the income would be 125 million lek. If the same area were planted with corn, with a yield of 8,000 kg/ha and a price of 33 lek/kg, the income would be 264 million lek. In the case of 1,000 hectares planted with potatoes, with a yield of 40,000 kg/ha and a price of 40 lek/kg, the income would be 1.6 billion lek,” he calculates.
Fires become unmanageable, municipalities, eyes towards the sky and waiting for the government
Last July in the village of Sheqeras, a fire engulfed 10 hectares of land belonging to a businessman from Qatar. It occurred right after the wheat was harvested. The Municipality of Maliq reacted promptly, but the land burned like a furnace, making the fight against the flames futile. Apart from the municipality and the police, who engaged with their resources, farmers from the area also pitched in. The intervention was very challenging. The soil temperature reached up to 80°C. Firefighters equipment’s air filters were blocked by peat dust. Excavators’ tires melted, and workers and residents’ shoes caught fire. During July and August, the fire remained active underground due to the lack of water in drainage channels. The fire was completely extinguished in early September by the rain.
Peatlands, according to agriculture expert Avni Spaholli, should be kept under water to prevent fires and their consequences. The only way to manage peatlands remains a functional irrigation and drainage system.
“Unlike mineral lands, peatlands can only be irrigated through infiltration. This means that the entire canal system must be cleaned and functional, both for drainage and irrigation,” says Spaholli.
The Municipality of Maliq says that 70% of the agricultural land area is covered by drainage systems, but the system remains non-functional due to the lack of water in the Podgoria reservoir. The Mayor of Maliq, Gëzim Topçiu, says that the only way to minimize fires in peatlands is the full operation of secondary and tertiary drainage and irrigation collectors.
“Before the ’90s, the Gjança reservoir also drained the lands of the Maliq field, which is not possible today due to water shortages. We have invested 45.2 million lek in the construction of the Vreshtasi hydrofoil, which removes excess water from the lands, sending it to the Podgoria reservoir. Despite increasing the water retention capacity of the Podgoria reservoir, the necessary amount to keep all peatlands underwater is still not ensured,” says Topçiu.
After Maliq, Lezha has the largest area, approximately 3,200 hectares of peatlands in the former Torovica marsh. Self-burning and fires by farmers occur here as well. The municipality claims to have a 100% operational irrigation and drainage system, including for the peatlands of Torovica. In the last three years, the municipality has invested 122.8 million lek in irrigation and drainage systems throughout its territory, but peatlands continue to flood.
In the Municipality of Divjakë, which administers about 600 hectares of peatlands from the former Tërbuf marsh, the risk of burning is even greater due to the complete absence of an irrigation system.
Serma Kasa, a resident of Tërbuf, says that fires are common in these lands. They sometimes occur accidentally and other times as a tradition of burning the land to make it more productive.
“I have 17.5 hectares of land in Tërbuf, which used to be marshes. When the wheat is harvested, it happens that someone throws a cigarette butt or a lighter onto the ground, and the fire spreads from the wind to Biçukas and Tri Urat. If the land had water, the fire wouldn’t spread. Today, everything is ruined, and the drainage channels have no water,” she says.
The Municipality of Divjakë, in response to the request for information, says that there have been no massive fires in peatlands in the last three years, but land burning by farmers is a phenomenon that continues. The drainage system of Tërbuf was damaged after the ’90s, and after three decades, the lands dry up for water, while the municipality finds it impossible to cope with its budget for investment in irrigation and drainage systems.
“The former Tërbuf commune does not have a proper drainage system. We are trying together with the Ministry of Agriculture to rebuild the system, which will enable the drainage of a considerable area,” says the Municipality of Divjakë.
Awaiting investment from the government, the Municipality of Divjakë has stepped in, spending 33 million lek from its budget on salaries for employees of the Directorate of Agriculture, the Water Management and Environmental Board, as well as for fuel.
Infrastructure problems remain unresolved, despite recent government investments reaching billions of lek. According to the National Water and Irrigation Strategy, 2019-2031, by the Ministry of Agriculture, Rural Development, and Water Administration, it is stated that 2.5 billion lek were invested in water, irrigation, and flood protection infrastructure for the period 2013-2015.
For the tons of burned peat, nobody seems to care.
The pollution caused by peat burning, according to foreign studies referenced by the National Environmental Agency, increases the level of greenhouse gasses released into the air by 40-60%, threatening the environment and the health of residents.
Residents of Sheqeras in Maliq complain that the annual burning of peatlands causes alarming air pollution. Last autumn, they protested as the burning of the peatlands, accompanied by dense smoke and heavy-smelling gases, continued for several months. 77-year-old Ajet Beqiraj describes the difficulties he and his family faced due to air pollution. “The smoke was suffocating; we couldn’t breathe, especially in the morning. As an elderly person, but also my grandchildren and nephews, we felt it a lot, even the children wore masks during class,” the elderly man said.
From the burning of peatlands, a phenomenon called “error erosion” occurs, where peat dust spreads in the form of smoke plumes and particles into the air. Expert Robert Damo has calculated that the amount of burnt peat over an area of about 2,000 hectares in Maliq, including the fire, is 2.5 million tons. A part of the peat dust remaining from the burning is carried by the wind over a vast territory, starting from the Maliq field and reaching the shores of Lake Ohrid in North Macedonia, covering a distance of 49 kilometers.
“Due to the phenomenon of error erosion, using the air erodibility equation, it turns out that the amount of eroded peat was 4.98 tons/ha per year for naturally mineralized soils and 8.29 tons/ha per year for burned material,” Damo said. The burning of peat emits greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, creating unsuitable conditions for vegetation and living organisms. In response to the request for information, the National Environmental Agency explains that CO2 (carbon dioxide), CO (carbon monoxide), and CH4 (methane) are released from the burning of peatlands. However, as the institution responsible for monitoring air quality, it states that it does not monitor emissions into the air.
“For as long as there is no data on pollution levels from peatlands, we cannot assess air quality in these areas,” the agency said. Despite the alarming extent of peat burning, which extends to several areas of Albania and can last up to half a year, authorities do not consider them as red flags of environmental pollution that need to be closely monitored. The three municipalities that administer the largest part of the peatland area, Maliq, Lezha, and Divjaka, admit that they lack funds and infrastructure to monitor air quality in their territory.
The environmental situation in local units affected by peat burning is not monitored by the Institute of Public Health either. In response to the request for information, the ISP stated that it has not conducted studies on air pollution derived from peatland burning, as it has not received notifications or complaints from the population or responsible structures in municipalities.
“We have sent letters to line institutions, which need to express themselves, as we are dealing with people,” Topçiu said. Expert Damo, in the study “Assessment of environmental and economic damage to peatlands, burnt and flooded areas of Maliq,” calculated the effects of peatland burning on an area of 1,900-2,000 hectares for nitrogen gases, calculated in N2O-N equivalent, and those of carbon in CO2-C, excluding methane emissions.
“On average, 48,175 tons of N2O-N have been emitted from peat burning, equivalent to an average of 44,816,472 tons of CO2 – equivalent, a very high amount compared to the average emission value of 5.8 kg N2O-N ha-1 year-1 from cultivated organic soils,” the expert said. He added that the amount of CO2-C emitted from peat burning once per hectare of peatland in Maliq is approximately equal to the average emitted for 35-45 years under normal cultivation conditions.
“CO2-C, released into the atmosphere from peat burning across the entire area, amounts to an average of 385,500 tons,” Damo said, concluding that the total emission of these greenhouse gases is 46.744 million tons of CO2 – equivalent, or approximately 1.5 times more than those predicted to be emitted by all sectors of the country’s economy over 10 years.
The environmental catastrophe resulting from peatland burning directly affects the health of the populations of these areas. The administrative units of Maliq and Vreshtas, where 18,000 residents live, are considered the main hotspots of air pollution. A specialist from the Local Health Care Unit of Korça, speaking on condition of anonymity, told INA Media that systematic burning of peatlands in the Maliq area has increased cases of respiratory or heart diseases among people and worsened the condition of chronic patients. The institution does not have accurate data on patients in these areas.
Experts consider peat dust released from peatland burning to be the most dangerous to the health of residents. Enkelejda Kucaj, an environmental expert, said that the smoke released from peatland burning also contains PM2.5 particulate matter, which is very dangerous as it goes directly into the lungs. “Chronic patients and children are the most at risk,” she said. Doctors in Korçë believe that the consequences of environmental pollution can be immediate but can also appear after several years. Diana Aliçkolli, head of the Dispensary Service at the Korçë Sanatorium, said that peat burning, wood burning for heating, construction, or any other activity with an environmental impact affects respiratory pathways.
“After the pandemic, we have seen an increase in the number of visits and admissions to the sanatorium. Chronic patients, who used to come once a year, are now coming three times a year. But how much the decrease in immunity from COVID and how much from environmental pollution has affected, studies need to be done,” Aliçkolli said. In the 2022 Environmental Status Report by the NAE, referring to the assessment of the European Environment Agency, the average annual levels of PM2.5, NO2, and O3 particulate matter, and the number of premature deaths for the period 2016-2020, are disclosed.
Environmental pollution comes with a hefty financial cost, both for citizens and the state budget. According to the World Bank report “The Cost of Global Health from PM2.5 Air Pollution,” it is stated that in 2019, 2,257 people in Albania lost their lives due to exposure to PM2.5 particles. The annual cost of health damages according to the World Bank for 2019 was $1.16 billion or 7.6% of the country’s GDP.
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