Analysis of spatiotemporal changes in wildfire occurrence in Kermanshah Province with emphasis on the network of protected areas

Knowledge of wildfire-prone areas is useful for identifying future challenges and formulating management strategies, therefore, monitoring and studying the behavior of this phenomenon can be effective in this regard. In this study, the areas affected by wildfires in Kermanshah province were obtained using the information related to the active fire of MODIS satellite during the years 2001 to 2022. Then, using the kernel density function, the density of fire occurrences for each year was calculated and the wildfire data was prepared in the form of density per square kilometer. Different density maps were entered into the non-parametric Mann-Kendall analysis in the form of a time series to calculate the trend of changes at a significance level of 95% or more (99%) with this method. According to the results, during the past 21 years, an area equal to 3613.31 square kilometers of the province's land has experienced an increase in the density of fires, and this amount is equal to 644.39 square kilometers for the decreasing trend. None of the protected areas of Kermanshah Province have a decreasing trend of wildfire density; however, areas from the north and northwest, west and east of the study area have an increasing trend of wildfire density. Most of the areas with an increasing trend of wildfires are located in high areas with high rainfall and are covered by Zagros forests. Among the protected areas, Shahu and Kohsalan as well as Buzin and Markhil have the most fluctuations and changes in wildfires density. The fact that a large part of these areas is covered by oak forests, drought, temperature increase, and the spread of intentional fires may be among the effective and important factors in this phenomenon. The fact that a large part of these areas is covered by oak forests may be among the effective and important factors in this phenomenon