A total of 62,454 fires were reported in the year through September, up 3,928, or 6.7 percent, from a year earlier and cracking the 60,000 mark for the first time in three years, according to an outline of a 2001 white paper complied by the Fire and Disaster Management Agency.
The outline, made available Wednesday, says 2,034 people were killed in fires from October 2000 to September, down 88 from the corresponding period a year earlier. Of the total, 936 people died in fires at their homes, with 517 of them over 65 years old.
The agency is expected to delilver the white paper to the Cabinet on Tuesday.
The agency will take various measures, such as promoting the installation of fire alarms in homes, to try to achieve its goal of cutting the house-fire death toll in half over the next 10 years, an agency official said.
According to the outline, arson was the cause of 7,817 fires, up 336 from a year earlier. It was the main cause of fires for the fourth year running.
Arson and suspected arson accounted for 22.2 percent of all fires in the 12-month period.
There were 17,308 house fires excluding arson cases, up 199 from the previous year.
Cigarettes were the cause of 20.4 percent of all fatal fires, the report says, followed by stoves and matches.