Dheza Marie Aguilar in ABS-CBN News: While the Philippines has yet to fully recover from the devastation brought by Tropical Storm Ondoy and the successive typhoons in October last year, the country’s weather agency has recently announced the possibility of the occurrence of the La Niña phenomenon.The rainy spells that come with it can trigger yet another “Ondoy” tragedy which the country cannot afford to have in just a year. Rick Heikoop, water and sanitation specialists and professor of water management at Rotterdam University of Applied Sciences, understands this problem very well. For most part, Heikoop thinks that the flooding problem in the country, especially in the urban areas, has a major connection to urban planning.
Heikoop, who spent 4 years studying urban planning in the University of the Philippines, has also worked with non-government organization Forge helping urban poor communities in the country. He cites the two biggest problems that cause flooding in urban communities are the continuous abuse of the rivers and lack of proper water storage facilities during rainy seasons.
“I think the biggest issue in mega cities like Manila and Cebu is the pollution of the river channels. People dump their garbage in the river so the capacity of the river will be diminished and in times of rainfall, the drainage capacity will not be enough to get rid of the water,” said Heikoop.
Studies say that 60% of the water pollution in Pasig River is caused by garbage thrown by residents of nearby areas and other materials thrown in the river. Heikoop said that people should be aware that when they throw garbage in the river, they will be the ones to suffer the flooding caused by this….
An aerial photograph of the area around the Manggahan Floodway in the immediate aftermath of Typhoon Ketsana in 2009, shot by Chajedidiah, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license
No comments:
Post a Comment