Pacya: The river fever

I AM afraid that your Ikarao son is starting to experience the influence of the year of the pig—I gained weight of more than a kilo for the past holidays.

I spent the last week of 2018 with my family at Karao, Bokod. The wrath of Typhoon Ompong gave a new façade of the small village. The river, the main source of farm irrigation, overflowed causing damages to agriculture and infrastructure facilities in the barangay. Unfortunately, it destroyed two houses and affected other structures including roads, flood levees and livestock cages.

The ongoing construction of the flood control project in the barangay added changes to the original state of the river. With the introduction of the development, it is continuously revitalizing the already crystal-clear and refreshing water flowing from the foot of Mt. Pulag gently sloping towards Ambuklao Dam.

While practicing my swimming skills in the riverbank, everything flashed back to me since childhood. The river is home to many children, especially during lunchtime and weekends. It serves as a venue for families to have closer ties while enjoying the blessings of the water.

However, there is an issue on waste management. I used to live beside the river and improper disposal of garbage is obviously evident. Some resolve to burning, others just throw their garbage near the waterside and roughly, only a few bury wastes in their backyards.

I remember that our sitio has a centralized dumping area before which was located near the river riprapped with stones. I know that the local officials also did some digging in most of the sitios but the whole community should work together in order to preserve and protect the cleanliness of the treasured river. This is my challenge to all politicians who filed their candidacy that one of their thrusts must be on environmental stewardship.

The river can be a monster anytime. Let us do our part in conserving it, after all, people can’t survive without a good environment.

***

To update the La Trinidad Cooperative Development Plan, a review and evaluation of it is scheduled on January 18-19 at Asin, Tuba. Participants for the event are the officers of the locality’s co-op council and representatives from the micro, small, medium and large cooperatives. The activity is geared towards improving the delivery of services of the La Trinidad co-op office.

Trending

No stories found.

Just in

No stories found.

Branded Content

No stories found.
SunStar Publishing Inc.
www.sunstar.com.ph