The same weather pattern that’s been keeping the weather steamy in Hawai‘i this summer is causing trouble of a different kind in the Philippines. HPR’s Bill Dorman has more in today’s Asia Minute.
El Nino is being blamed for everything from a busier than usual hurricane season in the central Pacific to a lighter than usual monsoon across India. Here’s another item to add to the list: water shortages in the Philippines.
This week, the Philippine government announced most of the country should expect “significant” reduction in rainfall beginning this month and stretching until next February. The National Water Resources Board says the main reservoir that supplies metropolitan Manila is already about 12% below levels officials consider “comfortable” to meet the needs of the capital city.
The outlook for fresh water is so grim that more than 350-thousand households in metropolitan Manila will face interruptions in their water service for as long as 12 hours at a time. Federal officials say that could start as soon as next week and might linger all the way through February. The plans are to rotate the water outages among different parts of the metro area…and affected households would be alerted a day ahead of time.
The archbishop of Manila says this is not just an environmental issue, but a moral one. This week he asked “Why do others have no water to drink, but the golf courses abound in water?” In the short term, any immediate resolution of the water crisis depends on the rain.
