By Hans Nicholas Jong JAKARTA — Fires razed nearly 1 million hectares (2.47 million acres) of lands and forests in Indonesia in 2023, as the country suffered from unusually scorching weather due to El Niño and burning for new plantations. Data from the Ministry of Environment and Forestry show that as many as 994,313.18 hectares — an area 15 times the size of Jakarta — burned from January to October 2023. This means the 2023 fire season is the worst since 2019, when fires burned 1.65 million hectares (4.07 million acres). The size of the 2023 fires represents a fivefold increase from the 204,8…