INCÊNDIOS E ÁREAS ARDIDAS NOS ÚLTIMOS 25 ANOS NO DISTRITO DE BRAGANÇA, PORTUGAL: ANÁLISE E ESTIMATIVA DE CONSEQUÊNCIAS PARA O RECURSO SOLO

Erosion is one of the threats to the soil in Portugal. It currently affects considerable areas, as is very evident in NE Tras-os-Montes. The areas burned by forest fires make it possible to fully show this potential risk of severe erosion, which impairs the ability of these areas to recover.This work searched the information available on the occurrence of fires in the District of Braganca from 1990 to 2015 (ICNF). The results show a marked variation over the series of number of occurrences and the burned area, and a large concentration of the burned area in a small number of occurrences, especially in 2013 (Picoes, 14130 ha). The great majority of the burned area corresponds to scrubland, and agricultural land accounts for the rest. Fires affect marginal areas, most of the soil is already at risk or severely degraded, while the recovery process is interrupted at each occurrence and then resumed with progressively greater limitation.