Wildfires are a growing concern across the world, as evidenced by the devastating impacts and media coverage that surround them each year. Ironically, new satellite data shows that the land surface burned around the world has actually declined 26% in the last 20 years. Wildfire exposure has increased on all continents except Europe and Oceania. Africa is particularly prominent in this regard, responsible for an estimated 85% of all wildfire exposures and over 65% of the global burned area. This piece unpacks the complexity beneath the numbers. It looks at the growing influences that are making wildfires more dangerous and draws artistic attention to the diverging trends we see across the country.
Rising Exposure in Africa and the Americas
The continent of Africa is crucial to understanding the global wildfire landscape. It bears the brunt of roughly 85% of all wildfire exposures. This increase is largely attributable to the expansion of agriculture, which has put more Americans in the path of fire. As agricultural activities expand into wildland areas, they often break up landscapes that would otherwise be more fire-prone by their very nature. This added human presence not only increases the likelihood of ignitions but makes fire management much harder to carry out on the ground.
In South America, it is a picture very similar to some of Africa’s troubles. Increasing frequency and severity of drought is the new normal. Simultaneously, more frequent and severe heat waves paired with agriculture expansion have dramatically increased wildfire severity. Over the last twenty years, severe wildfires have rapidly increased throughout North and South America. This alarming trend has environmentalists and policymakers alike very concerned.
Climate change—specifically the correlation between human-induced climate change and the increasing intensity of wildfires—is equally clear. As more people practice agriculture on the edges of wildland spaces, risk for ignition grows. In addition, climate change is intensifying these risks by drying out land, which creates an environment suitable for wildfires to thrive.
Declines in Europe and Oceania
Europe and Oceania have seen a decrease in their wildfire exposure over the same period. This is in considerable opposition to the experiences within Africa and the Americas. This phenomenon is mainly a product of urbanization, with more people flocking to cities and thus abandoning rural, wildfire vulnerable lands. In these areas, a smaller number of people living in high-risk zones means that they play an outsized role in lowering total human exposure to wildfires.
Even with these encouraging trends, Europe has not been completely insulated from intense wildfire seasons. European sister nations like Greece have suffered horrible wildfires, including the tragic 2018 wildfire in and around Athens that killed over 100 people. Together, these events underscore the complicated nature of wildfire behavior. They stress the importance of constant monitoring, even in places where exposure is overall on the decline.
Australia, and by extension Oceania, offers a strikingly similar story. The havoc wreaked by the 2019-2020 bushfire season, in making real the possibility of catastrophic fire, was a wake up call. Public policy and grassroots community engagement have fought very successfully to keep the risk from fire lower for decades.
The Global Context of Wildfire Behavior
In the last 40 years, days conducive to extreme fire behavior have increased by over 50%. It is worth mentioning that new fire ignitions drastically increased over this timeframe as well. Areas like North America, especially the United States, are facing more and more out-of-control wildfires that encroach on human communities. High-profile incidents like the 2025 Los Angeles fires have drawn attention to the urgent need for improved fire management strategies.
North America is key to global wildfire narrative. That’s only because it represents less than 2.5% of the world’s human exposure to these fires. In fact, just five central African countries—Democratic Republic of Congo, South Sudan, Mozambique, Zambia, and Angola—experience half of all global human exposure to wildfires. This inequitable allocation underscores an important opportunity for more organized influence and targeted research.
Reality is complicated The factors that influence fire behavior are multi-faceted, which require multi-faceted solutions. Hard-hitting public education campaigns that promote home fire safety are essential. Furthermore, strict enforcement of policies to limit human-caused ignitions, paired with effective engineering solutions to prevent fire spread, can greatly reduce smoking-related fire outbreaks.