OUR WATER PROBLEM IS TOO COMPLICATED

that nobody seems to be concerned about it and that there is no wholistic plan of action to prevent it from happening,” he said.

When Metro Manila suffered water shortage, there were those who suggested establishing the Department of Water and Water Resources. But when La Mesa Dam was filled with water after a heavy rain, the proposal was completely forgotten.

Just like climate change, the water crisis should be given much attention. Sandra Postel, director of the Massachusetts-based Global Water Policy Project, believes water problems will be right there with climate change as a threat to the human future.”

More importantly, higher global temperatures will worsen the current water problems.

“Although the two are related, water has no substitutes. We can transition away from coal and oil to solar, wind and other renewable energy sources. But there is no transitioning away from water to something else,” Postel said.

The Philippines is not yet what hydrologists call a “water stressed” nation. That label applies to a country whose annual water supplies drop below 1,700 cubic meters per person. When supplies drop below 1,000 cubic meters per person per year, the country faces water scarcity for all or part of the year.

While the country is still not “water stressed,” it already has areas suffering from water scarcity. Four river basins – Pampanga, Agno, Pasig-Laguna, and the island of Cebu – are experiencing water scarcity from time to time.

During summer months, many residents of Metro Manila – home to more than 10 million people – are coping with a “water supply crisis.” Metro Cebu in the Visayas and Davao City in Mindanao are already experiencing the same status.

Metro Manila, Metro Cebu, Davao, Angeles, Bacolod, Baguio, Cagayan de Oro, Iloilo and Zamboanga were identified by a study done by the Japan International Cooperation Agency in 1991 to be “water-critical areas.”

We need to solve our water problems now. Don’t just complain when there’s no water or when there’s too much water.

The problems are not the sole

FRED C. LUMBA SPECKS OF LIFE

“Most people do not really want freedom, because freedom involves responsibility, and most people are frightened of responsibility.” - STEPHEN FRY.

*******

By May 1 (Labor Day in the Philippines), the Chief Executive will be received by the POTUS (President of the United States) at the White House.

The DFA has not been drumbeating it as a state visit but Pinoys will likely ask why is it only now that PBBM was “invited” to Washington?

Every head of state is always elated when the POTUS rolls out the red carpet for his visitors.

This means that the visitor is a VIP who must be treated above the regular protocol and that a private audience always follows.

PBBM has been ignored for sometime by Joe Biden. In fact, even former PRRD was given the cold shoulder by Washington especially in the last two years of his incumbency in Malacanang. battle of water districts and government agencies. It’s a battle that everyone must help solve.

I think Washington “summoned” PBBM in relation to the EDCA relative to the Taiwan issue and the growing enmity between the US and China viz a vis the South China Sea.

Because the US needs to re-establish its military prominence and might in the Indo-Pacific, bigwigs like Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin have made physical stops recently in Manila as a way of stressing this point to the Philippine government.

So, PBBM is going to Washington for the principal reason that Biden wants to placate him for accommodating the US position sans unnecessary fanfare.

For this “hospitable Pinoy gesture,” Biden should have reciprocal “gifts” that we hope do not approximate the alms given to beggars.

In the past, the Philippines has been at the losing end of US endowments, be it in tariff and trade agreements and more so in military assistance.

One of the reasons why the country experiences water crises from time to time is due to the fact that its forest cover has gone down to only six percent. Many of our watersheds have been denuded.

Watersheds constitute about 75% of the total land area of the Philippines. “Our country has a total of 119 proclaimed and 154 priority watersheds,” the Laguna-based Philippine Council for Agriculture, Aquatic and Natural Resources Research and Development (PCAARRD) said.

Aside from water, watersheds also provide vital resources like soil, forest range, wildlife and minerals.

“Without trees in the forests and mountains, our rivers and creeks will run dry and agriculture will be adversely affected,” Piñol said. “While we virtually drown in floodwaters during the typhoon season, we suffer from water shortage after only two or three months of drought. This is simply because we have not even considered the adoption of a national water management and conservation program.”

Biden To Welcome Pbbm

Manila was the city worst destroyed during the Second World War and yet it was Japan whom the US wholly helped to get back on its feet.

Where are we today compared to the country of the rising sun?

Pinoys should be scared that the minute some Chinese idiot presses the button, the Philippines is already a target where all the EDCA sites are located.

By now, Pinoys know that the increasing American military presence in the Philippines commits the country to a war not of its own making.

Maybe some of us are just feeling freaky but the EDCA is not a joke anymore.

Sen. Imee Marcos, chair of the senate foreign relations committee, recently grilled DND chief Carlito Galvez in a panel probing the EDCA situation.

Galvez stammered and could not find the right words to fully explain what EDCA is all about, especially the new sites chosen to pre-position US military equip- ment and other stuff said to be geared to address natural disasters and calamities..

Sen. Imee retorted: “I am not satisfied” in relation to all the kilometric sentences Galvez uttered during the forum.

Biden and his Washington rah-rah boys will attempt to “drown” PBBM with “amenities” like a kid expecting a huge lifelike Teddy bear as a great Christmas present from his “ninong.”

Aside from a “royal” treatment, PBBM’s visit might also be exploited by Biden’s political operators to help improve the former’s very low survey ratings as the run up to the 2024 presidential election season begins to heat up.

The US embarassing withdrawal from Afghanistan (and the Taliban take-over of billions of dollars worth of military equipment left behind in Kabul and elsewhere) is a major issue the comebacking ex-president Donald Trump is employing to stress the failed Biden administration and its mismanagement of Amer-

Water is more precious than oil. It’s even more sparkling than gold. “Water, not oil, is the most precious fluid in our lives, the substance from which all life on the earth has sprung and continues to depend,” wrote Maryann Bird in a Time article.

Only 2.5% of the water that covers over 70% of the earth’s surface is considered fresh water. And only 1.3% is available for human use since most of the freshwater is trapped in glaciers, ice sheets, and mountainous areas.

“There is no more water on earth now than there was 2,000 years ago,” reminds the US National Wildlife Federation. “This limited supply of freshwater must meet the needs of a human population that has tripled in the last century and continues to grow at almost 80 million people per year.”

“Everyone agrees water is basic for life,” wrote Juan Mercado in his widely-read column some years back. “When cisterns go dry, disease and death rates surge. That ushers in economic decay – and political instability. Water riots can be ugly. And no one has yet invented a substitute for water.” ican foreign policy.

Personally, I think the US is looking at the Philippines and the EDCA as a great opportunity to save face and re-affirm to its allies around the world that it remains still the number one superpower in this planet.

In this circumstance, PBBM could find himself caught between the devil and the deep blue sea. Nowhere to turn to, nowhere to pivot even if he has expressed the country’s foreign policy that it is a “friend to all and enemy to none.”

PBBM cannot say that to XI Jin Ping anymore, even in a friendly whisper.

Look at how intrepid and shameless the Chinese ambassador to the Philippines has become, warning us about the fate of OFWs in Taiwan if something goes awry.

PBBM should send him back to Beijing where he naturally belongs. (Email feedback to fredlumba@yahoo.com.) GOD BLESS THE PHILIPPINES!

Now, if you want strawberries and glamping in one area, then don’t miss going to Taglucop Strawberry Hills (TSH) in barangay Lorega, Kitaotao in Bukidnon. Nestled in the Marilog District, it is about a two-hour ride from Ecoland Terminal in Davao City. The travel time is less if you have your own vehicle.

The owners – Atty. Ferdinand Taglucop and his wife, Jenny – originally intended the farm as a place where they could have a vacation from the busy schedules and business they have in Davao City.

But his children wanted to experience strawberry picking just like those in La Trinidad. And so the couple decided to plant strawberries on their farm.

His wife, Jenny, posted some photos in her social media account of the strawberries the farm produced while the children were busy picking the fruits. Before the couple knew it, people were starting to flock the farm. As