Farmers In Zamboanga Affected Due To Scarcity Of Water

The farmers, mostly from Ayala district complain that the Pamucutan River which is the source of their water supply has nearly dried up due to lack of rain since December of last year.

Even the Prime Water company which earlier supplies 50,000 cubic meters per day of potable water to the different barangays in the west coast area is now only supplying 26,000 cubic meters of water per day.

According to the farmers, the flow of the water from the Pamucutan River all goes to the Prime Water treatment plant while their irrigation canal which normally gets the water from the said river is now dry.

Many have stopped cultivating their rice fields because of the absence of water.

City Disaster Risk Reduction Management Officer Dr. Elmier Apolinario expressed support to the proposal earlier made by the Zamboanga City Water District (ZCWD) for the conduct of cloud seeding operation.

Apolinario said, there is still funds available since the biding for cloud seeding operation last year have failed.

The ZCWD promised to share Php 1Million pesos, Prime Water vowed to give Php 1 Million and the city government allocated Php 500,000 for cloud seeding.

The ZCDRRMO is set to coordinate with DOST Pag-ASA to determine if cloud seeding is still possible to bring the needed rain at the watershed of the city.

Until now, the water district and Prime Water are very dependent on rain from the water supply of its 63,000 consumers.