Farmers call for free irrigation

MANILA, Philippines – Saying it is long overdue, farmer and irrigator groups are calling on the government to fully implement a free irrigation service nationwide this year.

Led by the Kilusang Magbubukid ng Pilipinas (KMP), the associations formed the Pambansang Ugnayan para sa Libreng Irigasyon at Patubig (PATUBIG) to urge the Duterte administration to stop collecting irrigation service fees.

Farmers in Central Luzon pay up to P2,700 per hectare during the wet season and P3,500 during the dry season. In Bicol, the National Irrigation Administration (NIA) reportedly collects as high as P6,000 per hectare per cropping.

KMP secretary-general Antonio Flores said farmers would ensure that no fees would be collected this year.

“Free irrigation in 2017 is a significant result of farmers’ decades of assertion and struggle. It’s actually long overdue. It will help reduce production cost and is necessary to increase productivity and annual yield,” Flores added.

An additional P2.3 billion was allotted to NIA in the recently ratified P3.35-trillion national budget.

The extra fund is on top of the P30.4-billion allocation for the construction of new irrigation systems and restoration or rehabilitation of existing ones.

“The additional budget will relieve farmers from paying irrigation service fees, which are among the highest in Asia,” Flores said.

The KMP said NIA should first improve its services as farmers claim that the agency only services a small portion of the farming sector.

Flores noted that only 1.8 million of the four million hectares of farmlands nationwide have irrigation facilities.  

About 500,000 hectares of the 1.8 million, he added, are without water.

“NIA’s performance in the past years has been dismal. The new land area it serviced is only two percent of three million hectares per year,” Flores said.