Fires are one of the most disturbing factors for natural ecosystems. Currently devastating wildfires affect vast regions throughout the world, in particular the fragile ecosystems of the Mediterranean basin (Portugal, Spain, France, Italy, Greece and Turkey) that are known to be at high risk of desertification. Forest roads and firebreaks are more important in forest fire fighting. Forest roads can be defined as ecosystems because they occupy ecological space, have structure, support a specialized biota, exchange matter and energy with other ecosystems, and experience temporal change. A firebreak is a strip of bare land or vegetation that slows down fire. Firebreaks help protect soil, water, air, plant, animal, and human resources by preventing the spread of wildfires or controlling prescribed fires. This paper describes the standards of forest road and firebreak and analyses forest fire causes between 1994-2006 years in Turkey. Forest fire causes investigated by statistical analysis (Descriptive analysis, Kolmogorov-Smirnov test, One-way ANOVA, Test of Homogeneity of Variances, Post Hoc test, Duncan test, Hierarchical Cluster analysis). In recent years, Turkey has lost many forest areas to forest fires, and these not only result in loss of life, property, and infrastructure, but also cause deterioration in the natural environment and degrade ecosystems. In statistical terms, the number of forest fires in Turkey and the area burned fluctuate widely from year to year. In the last decade, the number of forest fires has increased, but the area burned per forest fire (ha) has decreased. The Turkish General Directorate of Forestry spent approximately $90 million to fight forest fires in 2005 and $800 million over the last decade. As of the end of 2006, the total number of forest fires in Turkey since 1937 is 80011, giving an average of 1143 fires per year. For the same period, the total forest area burned is 1571607 ha and the mean forest area burned per fire is 19.64 ha. There is no doubt that much progress has been achieved in forest fire prevention and protection in Turkey. However, with the fast-growing economy in Turkey, the present situation of forest fire protection is becoming severe. The main causes are that technical forest fire protection work has failed to keep up with social development and that regulation and management systems for forest fire protection are falling behind the present state of social development. Therefore, more effective regulations and rules should be set up soon, and a strategy should be developed in Turkey to carry out timely forest fire research work so as to cope with the new challenges of forest fire hazards in the future.

İstanbul Üniversitesi Orman Fakültesi

Orman İnşaatı ve Transportu Anabilim Dalı, Orman Hasılatı ve Biyometri Anabilim Dalı, Toprak İlmi ve Ekoloji Anabilim Dalı, Orman Entomolojisi ve Koruma Anabilim Dalı