Philippines to produce bigger geohazard maps for flood- and landslide-prone areas

Philippine Information Agency: The densification of geohazard and climate change maps is among the major projects to be implemented this year by the Mines and Geosciences Bureau (MGB) of the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR). Environment Secretary Ramon J.P. Paje said the densification project is aimed to produce geohazard maps with scale of 1:10,000 covering critical areas to show more details of the area covered by the map.

“The production of a 1:10,000-scale geohazard map is like zooming in the 1:50,000 map until we see the details of the area which cannot be represented in the 1:50,000-scale geohazard maps,” Paje said. Among the details that can be found in a 1:10,000-scale geohazard map include parameters or features in the area that may affect ground stability and the type of landslides that can possibly occur in the area.

“With the 1:10,000 map, the relocation sites can also be plotted, which we cannot be done in the 1:50,000-scale maps,” Paje said.

Priority in the densification project will be maps of provinces located in the eastern seaboard, according to him. These include the provinces of Quirino, Isabela, Nueva Vizcaya and Cagayan in Region 2; Aurora, Pampanga, Bulacan, Tarlac, Zambales and Bataan in Region 3; Quezon, Rizal, Laguna, Batangas and Cavite in Region 4A; Camarines Norte, Camarines Sur, Catanduanes, Albay, Sorsogon and Masbate in Region 5; Southern Leyte, Northern Leyte, Biliran and Samar Island in Region 8; Compostela Valley in Region 11; and Agusan del Sur, Agusan del Norte, Surigao del Sur in CARAGA region.

A field in the Aklan is flooded after Typhoon Fengshen hit the Philippine region in 2008. US Navy photo