PH cities face water shortages by 2025

Every single major city in the Philippines is expected to face some form of water shortage by 2025, according to a study funded by the US Agency for International Development (USAID), prompting calls from environment advocates for the implementation of a nationwide water demand management program.

At the same time, the members of the USAID’s “Be Secure” project pointed out that changing weather patterns would increasingly make rainfall overly abundant in the northern part of the country while becoming increasingly scarce in the souther regions in the coming years.

“In terms of impact [of climate change], there will be variability of rainfall. In the Philippines, that’s an increase [in rainfall] of as much as 44 percent largely in Luzon, and a decrease of 35 percent largely in Mindanao,” the group’s Climate Resiliency Team leader Elisea Gozun said in a press briefing.

These distortions would be increasingly evident in the coming years during the rainy months of June, July and August and the summer months of March, April and May, she said.

“Generally, it will be wetter during the wet seasons and drier during the dry seasons,” Gozun added.

Gozun, who formerly served as environment and natural resources chief under the Arroyo administration, pointed out that these increasing extremes in rainfall patterns and water supply distortions were being driven by scientific projections of an increase in global temperatures by between 0.9 to 1.1 degrees Celsius by 2020, and by 1.8 to 2.2 degrees Celsius by 2050.

“The highest increase in temperature is going to be experienced by Mindanao,” she stressed. “So the reduction in rainfall is mainly in Mindanao, the temperature increase [will be felt most] in Mindanao, and Mindanao’s principal source of power is hydroelectric power.”

As such, there will be major implications for both the island’s power sector as well as the agriculture sector.

Gozun pointed out that the current El Niño phenomenon—believed to be the most severe incidence since the late 1990s—being experienced by the Philippines has also been demonstrated historically to have a severe impact on food supply.

“Based on past El Niño events, even just a 1-degree Celsius increase in temperature already results in a 15-percent reduction in rice production,” she warned.

The USAID project brought to the Philippines several international experts to advice various sectors of society, from the government to the academe to the business community, on the need for an aggressive water demand management program to help mitigate the effects of the expected decline in water supply in the coming years.

The team of experts is composed of Mary Ann Dickinson, president and CEO of Alliance for Water Efficiency in California; Maysoon Zoubi, former secretary general of the Ministry of Water and Irrigation of Jordan; and Stuart White, director of the Institute for Sustainable Futures, University of Technology in Sydney, Australia.

The three experts all pushed for a multisectoral approach to the issue of declining water supply in the Philippines, starting with a massive information campaign to make all sectors of society aware of the looming problem.

The team has been meeting with representatives of various sectors this week and will make a presentation before the business community on Friday to enlist the help of the country’s biggest corporations in the effort.

The “Be Secured” project’s “National Water Strategy” advocates for increased water efficiency in water supply, industrial water use and irrigated agriculture as well as the setting of the appropriate water tariffs and incentives to promote water efficiency.

It also advocates the use of alternative water resources where possible, including rainwater harvesting, “greywater” use for household cleaning and irrigation, the use of treated wastewater for agriculture and the setting up of desalination facilities for the treatment of sea and brackish water.