Wildfire
The Wildfire Crisis: All hands, All Lands. NAFO members are taking action.
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Severe wildfires threaten lives, homes, jobs, infrastructure, and natural resources. Fire seasons are becoming longer and more intense, putting forests and communities at greater risk.
While there is no “silver-bullet” for solving the wildfire crisis, sustainable forest management is a proven tool for mitigating the risk of severe wildfires and for helping forests recover after severe fire events.
NAFO members’ sustainable forest management helps reduce wildfire risk by keeping forests healthy and resilient. They also quickly replant forests burned by wildfire. Risk mitigation and prompt restoration are essential to preserve forest investments and support healthy markets for forest products. Fuels reduction treatments, maintaining forest access, and fuel breaks can reduce wildfire risk.
How NAFO Members Repond
NAFO members are working alongside public agencies, communities, and landowners to reduce wildfire risk and build resilience across the landscape. Their efforts include:
- Sustainable forest management – keeps forests healthy and resilient.
- Proactive fuel treatments – Thinnings and prescribed burns keep fuel loads at healthy levels.
- Active fire suppression – employing firefighting crews to respond quickly and safely.
- Collaboration – coordinating across ownerships and stakeholders, because once ignited, fires know no boundaries.
Groundbreaking Partnerships
NAFO members are committed to collaborating, communicating openly, and finding innovative solutions to the wildfire crisis.
In an unprecedented step, NAFO and the U.S. Forest Service have signed two groundbreaking memorandums of understanding (MOUs) to strengthen public-private coordination in wildfire management.
prevention
Cross-Boundary Fuel Break MOU
To reduce wildfire risks, NAFO and the U.S. Forest Service signed an agreement enlisting NAFO members’ resources to extend fuel breaks on NAFO member lands to NEPA-ready federal lands, at cost. These strategically thinned areas of forests slow the spread of wildfire and create safer conditions for firefighting. By applying private sector efficiency to public lands, we lower costs and increase impact.
MOU executed February 2024
Supression
Initial Attack Fire Suppression MOU
When fires ignite, speed matters. A second agreement allows NAFO members to deploy private firefighting crews and equipment near the boundaries of federal and private forestlands – at no cost to the Forest Service during initial attack. Because NAFO’s resources and response teams are appropriately trained and sometimes closer to the fire’s location, they can safely help suppress fires before they escalate. This partnership delivers a safe, fast, and more effective wildfire response at a lower cost.
MOU executed March 2023
Without proactive treatments and shared responsibility, wildfire risk grows – threatening not just forests, but lives, jobs, and infrastructure. NAFO members are stepping up to help safeguard forests and communities while strengthening America’s resilience to severe wildfire.
Wildfire Frequently Asked Questions
Wildfire is a complex natural process influenced by climate, forest conditions, past land-use decisions, and local ecology – no single factor can fully explain today’s fire behavior. When issues are this complex, oversimplified or incomplete explanations can quickly gain traction. The science is clear that effective wildfire mitigation requires a combination of strategies, not a single cause or solution.
For a deeper look at how to separate wildfire fact from fiction, see the Wildfire Misinformation Factsheet distributed by the Society of Environmental Journalists.
Many U.S. forests — especially in the West — are more vulnerable to severe wildfire due to increased stressors like climate change, unnaturally high tree densities, and widespread tree mortality. These conditions leave far too much flammable material on the ground and across the landscape.
For much of the last century, fire suppression policies prevented natural, low-intensity fires that once cleared out excess fuels. Combined with a warming climate, today’s wildfires often burn hotter, spread farther, and impact larger areas than what was historically normal for many ecosystems.
For further reading: Hessburg et al. 2005, 2019; Falk et al. 2011; Safford & Stevens 2017; Singleton et al. 2019; Parks & Abatzoglou 2020; Hagmann et al. 2021.
Sustainable forest management (SFM), including logging, is a proven tool for mitigating the risk of severe wildfires before they even start. Practices to mitigate wildfire risk include:
- Proactively reduce fuel loads and risk by clearing excess fuels (dry vegetation) from the forest floor, conducting controlled burns, and creating firebreaks;
- Periodically reduce the number of trees present by thinning out smaller trees;
- Maintain forest access;
- Actively suppress a fire when it starts;
- Encourage collaboration between landowners and other key stakeholders; and
- Quickly replant forests burned by wildfire.
As fire seasons become longer and more severe, sustainable forest management and innovative public/private partnerships are more important than ever before.
Yes. There is abundant evidence that fuel reduction treatments work — especially those that use fire itself, such as prescribed or managed burns. These treatments can slow wildfire spread, reduce intensity, lower severity, and even cut smoke production, even under extreme weather conditions.
Mechanical treatments are also effective. By thinning smaller trees and reducing excess woody material, they create conditions where larger, fire-tolerant trees are more likely to survive. Together, these approaches reduce the buildup of fuels that has accumulated from decades of fire suppression and exclusion.
For further reading: Safford et al. 2012; Prichard & Kennedy 2014; Lydersen et al. 2017; Prichard et al. 2020, 2021; Jones et al. 2022; North et al. 2021; Agee & Skinner 2005; Schwilk et al. 2009; Stephens et al. 2009, 2012, 2020, 2021; Collins et al. 2014; Hessburg et al. 2019, 2022.
No. Mechanical fuel reduction has a very different purpose and outcome than commercial logging. These treatments are designed to retain medium and large fire-tolerant trees—the ones most likely to survive future fires—while removing smaller or fire-intolerant trees and dense woody material that have accumulated after decades of fire exclusion.
Most of this material has limited or no commercial value. In some cases, removing certain larger fire-intolerant trees is necessary to restore forest structure and improve resilience. The phrase “fuels-reduction logging” is misleading—it conflates restoration treatments with traditional timber harvests.
See the Wildfire Misinformation Factsheet for more information.
Wildfires take a tremendous toll on the U.S. economy. The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) estimates annual costs ranging between $71.1 billion and $347.8 billion. The costs – which include firefighting expenses, infrastructure damage, and lost economic productivity – underscore the need for innovative solutions.
Recommended resources on wildfire:
- Society of Environmental Journalists: Wildfire Misinformation Fact Sheet
- Environmental Defense Fund: Wildfire and Climate Change
- National Interagency Wildfire Center
- U.S. Forest Service: Wildland Fire
- U.S. Department of the Interior: Wildland Fire
- Watch Duty’s wildfire maps and alerts
