Wildfire management at a crossroads: Mitigation and prevention or response and recovery?

Catastrophic wildfires—those that kill and injure people, destroy homes and communities, cause widespread evacuations, and cost large sums of money to suppress—are on the rise around the world. With global warming, it is likely that such impacts will continue to increase in scope, frequency, and magnitude (1). We examine the case of the Canadian province of British Columbia (BC) as a good example of a government at a crossroads: Does it begin to invest heavily in proactive large-scale efforts to mitigate the effects of current and future wildfires (i.e., preventive landscape-scale treatments), or does it continue to primarily react with fire suppression and postburn recovery measures? Although we focus on BC, this same tough question, along with lessons learned and our main recommendations, apply to regional and national governments in dozens of countries.