The country’s water stress level increased in the past 10 years, according to the latest water accounts released by the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA).
Based on the PSA figures, freshwater withdrawal as a proportion of available freshwater resources increased to 28.74 percent in 2019 from 25.48 percent in 2010.
PSA data showed that the total Freshwater Water Withdrawals reached 94,019.21 million cubic meters (mcm) in 2019 from 83,345.23 mcm in 2010.
“Although it increased by three percentage points, the annual level of water stress since 2010 consistently fell within the low-level classification range of 25 percent to 50 percent,” PSA said.
Further, the data showed Water Use Efficiency (WUE), or the value added per volume of water used, increased to P198.41 per cubic meter in 2019 from P126.1 per cubic meter of water used in 2010.
“During the period, the service sector consistently had the largest WUE, followed by the industry sector and agriculture sector,” PSA said.
The data showed the country’s total water abstraction, or the amount of water that is removed from its source either permanently or temporarily, increased by 12.3 percent to 218 billion cubic meters (bcm) in 2019, from 194.1 bcm in 2010.
For the same period, on the average, PSA data showed 98.1 percent of the total abstraction were from surface water and the remaining 1.9 percent from ground water.
The PSA said on the average, some 98.9 percent of the abstracted water was for own use, while the remaining 1.1 percent were intended for distribution to other economic units.
Water abstracted for own use increased to 215 bcm in 2019 from 192.3 bcm in 2010. On the average, the largest amount of self-abstracted water was for the power sector at 57.8 percent.
This was followed by the agriculture sector at 33.9 percent, mining and quarrying, manufacturing, and construction at 5.6 percent and the services sector and households, 2.7 percent.
The data also showed that the amount of water for distribution also increased to 3 bcm 2019 from 1.8 bcm in 2010. On the average, more than half of the distributed water or 55 percent were used by households.
This was followed by the service sector at 31.5 percent, then mining and quarrying, manufacturing, and construction sector at 12.5 percent. PSA said the smallest amount of distributed water was used by the sectors of agriculture and power.
The creation of the Department of Water to address the “fragmented” water administration has been proposed earlier. Currently, several agencies are in charge of water administration and regulation.
Former Environment Secretary Elisea Gozon said the proposal to create a separate Department of Water has been around since the term of Former President Fidel V. Ramos. However, it was only now under the Duterte administration that was it given serious attention.
Gozon said these developments could not have been more needed as the country’s water resources are already under stress.
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