Last night, at the end of the 5-week on-line lecture series on Modern Pressurized Irrigation and Fertigation in Tropical Regions conducted by the Mashav of Israel, I realized just how far behind we are in the technology of watering our plants to produce more, even during off-season.
While modern irrigation technology already introduces precision watering and the mixing of fertilizer in irrigation water for even and exact distribution, the Philippines still relies on water drenching or gravity irrigation while fertilizer is still sown by hand.
The water drenching or gravity irrigation where water flows from dams through open canals is the oldest system of irrigation.
As water becomes a scarce commodity, the need for precision irrigation has become a must.
True, the Department of Agriculture (DA) took a major modernization program by implementing the Solar-Powered Irrigation System in 2017, the project had not received enough financial support.
It was actually I, as Secretary of Agriculture, who pushed for the adoption of Solar-Powered Irrigation System after introducing it to President Rodrigo Duterte in 2017.
The positive feedback from farmers who benefitted from the first 200 units built nationwide, however, failed to convince the financial managers to allocate more funds for the program.
Even the P44-B loan offer by Israel to the Philippines for the establishment of modern Solar-Powered Irrigation Systems to irrigate about 500,000 hectares made in 2019 has hardly moved.
The Israeli Agronomist who delivered the last lecture last night, Roy Peleg, said that for agriculture and irrigation to move forward, key decision makers in government must understand the critical role of modern farming technology to boost food production.
With the growing population and shrinking agricultural areas, modern irrigation and agricultural technology is the only hope in feeding the future generation.
#FoodGrowsWhereWaterFlows!
(Photos of the SPIS units implemented during my stint as Agriculture Secretary were downloaded from public websites and Facebook.)
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