The National Irrigation Administration (NIA) has assured rice growers in Nueva Ecija that Pantabangan Dam will be able to provide them sufficient water for irrigation.

The assurance was made by Antonio Nangel, manager of the NIA-Upper Pampanga River Integrated Irrigation Systems (NIA-UPRIIS) during a recent consultative meeting with farmer leaders and heads of the NIA and other agencies attached to the Department of Agriculture (DA).

An optimistic Nangel said Pantabangan Dam can sufficiently sustain the water requirements of the standing crop and may be able to irrigate farms for the quick turnaround cropping or third cropping and “rationing” farming.

Rice ratooning is the ability of standing crops to regenerate new tillers after harvest.

In a report to Agriculture Secretary Arthur Yap, Nangel said the UPRIIS is pushing for rice ratooning due to its low irrigation requirement, reduced production cost and higher yield per unit area in less time.

“The Pantabangan Dam water level of 207 meters, as of Feb. 9 is still above the operation rule curve," he said. "Given the 102,550 hectares we programmed this dry crop and its total water requirement of 1,283.71 million cubic meters (MCM) until the April harvest, Pantabangan Dam is still at the ideal or safe level of 194.00 meters. With this water elevation, UPRIIS can still program around 25,000 hectares for third cropping or Quick Turn Around (QTA) or ratooning or both at the same time."

Present during the consultative meeting were DA Region 3 Director Redentor Gatus and Philippine Rice Research Institute (PhilRice) Director Ronilo Beronio, both of whom lauded the efforts of UPRIIS to mitigate the adverse effects of El Niño on rice production in Central Luzon.

Gatus assured farmers during the meeting that seed and fertilizer subsidies would be made available to those adopting the QTA, while Beronio said PhilRice is preparing flyers to disseminate information on rice ratooning.

The meeting was also attended by representatives from the National Food Authority (NFA), Land Bank of the Philippines, Bureau of Post Harvest and Research Extension (BPRE), National Seed Quality Control Service (NSQCS), DA officials at the local level, and federation presidents of Irrigators Associations (IA) comprising the Board of Directors of the UPRIIS Confederation of Farmer Irrigators Associations (UCFIA).