CEBU CITY – No money will be wasted in the conduct of cloud-seeding operations in the province of Bohol.
BAGS of salt are loaded into a plane for cloud-seeding in Bohol on Monday, June 24. (Contributed photo)
The Department of Agriculture (DA)-Bohol gave this assurance as it defended the ongoing cloud-seeding in the province despite the announcement of the onset of the rainy season.
A P5-million budget for cloud-seeding in Bohol is funded by the DA-Bureau of Soil and Water Management from the General Appropriations Act 2024 under the National Rice Program Production Support Services.
A private supplier has been contracted for the 50-hour cloud seeding.
Engineer Cecile Opada, science research specialist of DA-Bohol, said eight clouding-seeding operations equivalent to 11 hours have already been conducted.
The ninth cloud-seeding operation was ongoing as of posting time.
Although the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical, and Astronomical Services Administration-Central Visayas (PAGASA-7) has declared the onset of the rainy season, Bohol still needs more water to enable farmers to start tilling their farms, Opada said.
Opada said the conduct of the cloud-seeding was actually based on the request of farmers’ association in Bohol.
Although Bohol and other areas in the region are already experiencing rains, the province still has below-normal rainfall weather conditions.
“Bohol has a unique type of climate. In other regions, if it's the wet season, it’s really wet in their areas. Bohol has Type 3 and Type 4 climate, it’s really dry. In the 30-year average rainfall record of PAGASA, the highest rainfall recorded in Bohol was at 70.65 millimeters and it came in October when it is really the rainy season. So now, we are still in way below-normal rainfall conditions according to Pagasa,” said Opada.
Opada said should the amount of rainfall be enough for farmers to tilt their land and the 50-hour contract has yet to be consumed, the cloud-seeding operations can always be stopped.
“We can issue a stoppage order to the supplier. But we can issue another resumption order when the dry season arrives. We can use the remaining hours. We can always resume. There is nothing to worry because no money will be wasted,” Opada said.