Korea Forest Service (KFS) on Dec. 13 conducted a joint drill to extinguish bush fires in cooperation with 10 government agencies and related institutions at the Central Forest Disaster Situation Room in the case they occur simultaneously in the spring.
The participants included the Ministry of the Interior and Safety (MOIS), the National Fire Agency (NFA), Korea Heritage Service (KHS), regional forest offices and local government bodies.
The drill was carried out on the condition that large-sized bush fires occur in several parts of the nation simultaneously.
After the situation was spread via the bush fire situation control system, the drill looked at each institution’s response according to the direction and intensity of bush fires using bush fire expansion prediction information.
During the drill, evacuation orders had been issued to about 200 residents in five villages where fires were expected to spread.
A central accident control headquarters was inaugurated to inspect residents’ evacuation and relief of victims.
Strategies to protect power transmission facilities and national heritage properties from fires had been established, and vehicles and manpower designed to combat fires were placed to cope with dangerous goods.
Participating organizations shared real-time information on the situation via drones with thermographic cameras.
They participated in a drill to install portable water storage tanks, which are essential for combating fires and how to use them.
Koh Dae-yeol, director in charge of forest resources at the Chungcheongnam-do provincial government, who participated in the drill said, “Ten bush fires hit the Chungcheongnam-po area for the day of April 2, 2023, and two of them developed into large-sized ones, causing lots of difficulties to combat them, and we can raise capabilities to combat bush fires by conducting systematic drills using advanced equipment and prediction information.”
Lee Yong-kwon, director in charge of forest disaster control at KFS who oversaw the drill, said, “We’ve managed to examine the effectiveness of strategies through aggressive cooperation among related organizations and advance capabilities to prevent bush fires and combat them through continued trainings and development of fire extinguishing technologies.”
Korea Forest Service conducted a joint drill to extinguish spring bush fires in cooperation with 10 government agencies and related institutions at the Central Forest Disaster Situation Room on Dec. 13.
KFS Selects Chestnut as ‘Forest Product of Month’
KFS said on Dec. 13 that chestnut, a sweet representative side dish popular during winter, had been selected as the “Forest Product of the Month” in December.
Chestnuts are rich in vitamin C and are efficacious for skin care, fatigue relief, and prevention of cold, while inner chestnut shell, containing tannin, was effective in curing diarrhea.
Chestnuts can be eaten just by steaming. Diverse recipes for cooking chestnuts, including “sweet red bean jelly with chestnut,” enjoy popularity.
Chestnuts can be used to add taste to cake and bread. They’re a must ingredient for cooking rice with several mixed grains.
Inner chestnut boiled in sirup can be mixed with yogurt and ice cream for making soup, latte and others.
Korean Firms’ Participation in Forest Management Helps Realize Public Value
Korea Forest Service held an awards ceremony for the “2024 Forest ESG Best Practice Contest” at Daejeon Government Building on Dec. 11.
The contest was designed to help companies ramp up their forest management capabilities for social contributions by exploring and spreading innovative practices to realize environmental values through forests.
Twenty-one management cases in the forest sector were accepted, and five out of the total were selected as finalists.
Among the selected best practices were creation of forests along sides of expressways and forests in idle sites, presented by Korea Expressway Corp. and creation of urban woods garden using successors of Songni Jeongipumsong and Jeongbuinsong pine trees, natural monuments, by Shinhan Card’s in-house venture.
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