Water woes threaten kalinga rice fields

By Dexter A. See

TABUK CITY, Kalinga – Agriculture stakeholders here warned Wednesday the dwindling water supply in the country’s rice fields due to water scarcity from the deteriorating upland communities poses serious threat to rice yields that may compromise the country’s bid to be rice self-sufficient in the next several years.

Despite best efforts to irrigate the vast tracts of agricultural land in this rice granary of the Cordillera, officials of the National Irrigation Administration said there are still thousands of hectares of irrigable lands in the low-lying areas in the region that remain unserviced by the agency, thereby greatly affecting rice production in those areas.

Because of deforestation, many agricultural areas in the upland towns of the region are now encountering scarcity of water, thus, the production of agricultural crops in these areas is also compromised which threatens the region’s food security.

For example, NIA Cordillera regional officials said in Kalinga alone, only 17,000 hectares out of the 20,000 hectares of agricultural lands are irrigated with the use of the existing national and community irrigation systems.

By year 2013, the national government aims to achieve food self-sufficiency, thus, the agriculture department is strengthening efforts to irrigate vast tracts of agricultural land through the community-based irrigation systems in order to empower local residents to care for their environment pursuant to the thrust of the Regional Development Council to preserve and protect the region’s deteriorating forests.

Based on a recent assessment of the Asian Development Bank (ADB), Cordillera is lagging behind in irrigation with only Abra and Kalinga having decent irrigation systems bolstered by the support of concerned agencies and local government units while Apayao and Mountain Province still lag behind other provinces.