Tubiig! Water Crisis in Central Luzon

Blogger's Note: Water crisis is looming north of Metro Manila. It affect the metropolitan area as well as nearby provinces such as Cavite and Laguna. Notice that it uses the watershed as a basic unit for planning. Soil is considered as essential component in planning also. Read on...

Plugging the water crisis in C. Luzon
First posted 01:36am (Mla time) Aug 17, 2005 By Tonette Orejas, Inquirer News Service
http://news.inq7.net/regions/index.php?index=1&story_id=47133

SCIENTISTS and government officials gathered in Pampanga for the first time last month to chart a road map to avert a looming water crisis in Central Luzon.
Metro Manila, one of the experts suggested, should start looking beyond the region as its principal source of domestic water.

The "impending serious" water shortage will likely hit Central Luzon in 2025, said Dr. Rex Victor Cruz, a forestry expert from the University of the Philippines, Los Baños (Laguna).
This is simply because the demand-supply equation is lopsided, he said.
Central Luzon, with a population of 9 million, comprises the provinces of Aurora, Bataan, Bulacan, Nueva Ecija, Pampanga, Tarlac and Zambales.

By 2025, when the population in the region would double, the demand for water would have soared twice the potential supply of 12.5 million cubic meters.

To meet future needs, Cruz urged concerted action to strengthen the region's natural systems, mainly the forests of the Sierra Madre, Bataan and Zambales ranges. He spoke at last month's Central Luzon Integrated Water Resource Management Summit.

The watersheds, or vegetation that serves as natural sponges which retain soil, hold water and feed it to rivers, should be sustained by reviving and protecting the forests. Cruz called watersheds the "best defenses" of human settlements when there's little water during dry months and when there's so much of it during rainy months.

Watersheds are the best way to prevent floods and droughts, which Central Luzon has been experiencing in the last three decades.

The region, spanning 2.147 million hectares, has a remaining forest area of 550,921 has, mainly in Aurora, Bulacan, Nueva Ecija and Zambales.

Signs
Forests are not well replenished as the amount of rainfall on the Nueva Ecija side of the Sierra Madre has decreased amid higher temperature in the area, Cruz said, citing studies.

Droughts, on the other hand, have been disastrous in the region. For instance, the 1997 and 1998 droughts, caused by the El Niño phenomenon, parched a total of 208,000 has, ruining P140.4 million worth of crops.

The heavy withdrawal of groundwater, widely used in the region through shallow and deep wells, has caused coastal areas to sink 10 times faster than the global rise of oceans, aggravating floods in Bulacan, Bataan and Pampanga, according to marine geologists Kelvin Rodolfo and Fernando Siringan.

The water-holding capacity of the Pantabangan Dam, also in Nueva Ecija, has fallen by 10 percent due to siltation. About 466,000 has of the region's land area suffer from moderate to serious erosion.

Siltation problems also plague the Pampanga River Basin and its 30 or so tributaries in the eastern half of Central Luzon.

Pollution from farms and fishponds, as well as waste from homes and factories, have reduced the capacity of the Candaba and San Antonio swamps-covering 9,759 square kilometers-to serve as a natural catchment of water.

Conflicts
Already, the competition for water has intensified. A case in point is the Angat reservoir system in Bulacan, said Dr. Guillermo Tabios of the National Hydraulic Research Center of the University of Philippines in Diliman, Quezon City.

Angat Dam irrigates 28,000 has, supplies 65 percent of Metro Manila's domestic needs, provides 5 percent of Luzon's power demand, and controls flood.

Water inflow has not been enough such that Angat has had to be augmented by the Umiray River at the boundary of Aurora and Quezon since 2001, Tabios said.

While water rights at Angat have been established since 1979 -36 cubic meters per second (cms) to the National Irrigation Administration (NIA) and 31 cms to the Metropolitan Waterworks and Sewerage System (MWSS) -the reallocation of NIA's water share to Metro Manila during the 1998 drought was made at the expense of Bulacan farmers. Their damage suit for crop losses is pending with the MWSS.

A similar dispute is likely to happen again.

"A concern in the future is the ever increasing demand for domestic water supply in Metro Manila, which is projected to reach as much as 60 to 65 cms by year 2010. The Angat reservoir water allocation in this case will no longer be enough unless NIA gives up its irrigation water allocation, which is possible if certain irrigated lands are retired," Tabios said.

Metro Manila, he added, should look beyond Angat and instead draw from other sources, possibly from the reservoirs in Laiban, Laguna and Umiray.

The water deficit has implications beyond the region.

In addition to providing water for Metro Manila, Central Luzon also produces 20 percent of the country's food.

If not averted, the problem can stunt the progress of the Subic-Clark growth corridor, the country's platform as Southeast Asia's leading logistic and warehousing hub.

The water crisis threatens the basics of survival-food, health, safety and jobs. his is not to say, though, that water management has been a neglected agenda, said Renato Diaz, presidential adviser for Central Luzon, who, together with the regional National Economic and Development Authority and the Regional Development Council, steered the summit to a conclusion of hope and action.

"We needed to integrate efforts," Diaz said.

The road map begins by bringing the task of managing water sources and regulating water use, including tariff-setting, down to the regional, provincial, town, city and barangay levels.

This strategy sits well with Ramon Alikpala, executive director of the National Water Resources Board. "Water is best managed by the same people who live off the resource," he said.
Complex arena

More than 100 participants got a realistic view from former economic planning chief and now Budget Secretary Romulo Neri, who said that water management and allocation covered a "complex arena."

Governance, according to Neri, will play a major role in ensuring an equitable distribution of water as a survival resource and development capital.

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