Pangasinan seeks funds for dam regulation pond By Dexter A. See | Aug. 19, 2014 at 12:01am LINGAYEN, Pangasinan—Governor Amado Espino Jr. led leaders here in appealing to Presidential Assistant on Food Security and Agriculture Modernization Francis Pangilinan for allocating funds to finish the P4.6-billion Re-Regulation Pond of San Roque Dam in San Manuel. At the inauguration of the reservoir’s Phase 1 project over the weekend, Espino said the east bank gate of the main canal has to completed before water can flow to 10 more eastern Pangasinan towns, two towns in Tarlac and one town in Nueva Ecija. He said the entire project would boost the government’s goad of food security while improving the income and living standards in the agriculture sector particularly the poor farmers. Pangilinan said he supported Espina’s position given the province’s stature as a food bowl in Luzon. “Farmers are valuable because they provide the food that we eat,” he said, adding that he would hold another meeting with to include the congressional representatives of the 4th, 5th and 6th districts of the province. San Roque dam supplies water to farmers working on 55,000 hectares of land along with the Agno River Integrated Irrigation Project (ARIIP) which serves the irrigation needs of about 28,000 farm-families in Pangasinan and across some 34,450 hectares of land. The construction of re-regulation pond will serve as diversion dam for the two existing National Irrigation Systems, the Agno River Irrigation System (ARIS) and Ambayaoan Dipalo River Irrigation System (ADRIS) to irrigate 26,850 hectares and 7,600 hectares of farmland, respectively. The project is financed by the China Exim-Bank through its preferential Buyers Credit Facilities with Chinese contractor, CAMCE under the supervision of National Irrigation Authority engineers. NIA, on the other hand, estimated P1 billion worth of incremental harvests from the irrigation system this year which will increase to P5 billion by 2016 once the remaining phases are finished. Sixth District Rep. Marlyn Primicias-Agabas said the first phase would not benefit Pangasinan farmers yet because of the suspended work on the 10-kilometer main canal and other critical infrastructure to connect the reservoir to the river systems in the eastern part of the province. “Many farmlands are idled as a result,” she said. Agabas said the project’s completion was excluded in the 2014 and 2015 national budget. Oftociano Manalo, president of Regional Federation of Irrigators’ Association, said the fully operational project would increase Pangasinan’s output to about 30 million cavans of milled rice per cropping season.
Posted on: Tue, 19 Aug 2014 09:21:29 +0000
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