NIA administrator Ricardo Visaya releases fingerlings on the dam reservoir. Photo by Armand M. Galang
GEN. TINIO, Nueva Ecija – On top of irrigating 700.87 hectares rice fields in at least four villages in two Nueva Ecija towns, the newly constructed Upper Tabuating Small Reservoir Irrigation Project was designed for aquaculture, tourism and cash crops and energy production, National Irrigation Administration chief Ricardo Visaya said Tuesday.
Leading the inauguration of the P878-million dam in Barangay Nazareth here, Visaya said the NIA has been expanding irrigation projects from mere watering rice fields to supporting cash crops and energy among others.
Visaya, along with NIA deputy administrator for administrative and finance retired Major Gen. Romeo Gan, Upper Pampanga River Integrated Irrigation System department manager Rosalinda Bote, Nueva Ecija 4th District Rep. Maricel Nagaño, Mayor Isidro Pajarillaga of this town, and provincial human resource chief Roseten Tugaff also released 12,000 tilapia fingerlings onto the reservoir.
Visaya said at least P30-billion worth of irrigation projects in Ilocos Sur, Ilocos Norte and Abra are among the biggest projects that the NIA has in the pipeline.
Such projects which were originally proposed during the Marcos administration are now at the National Economic Development Authority, he said.
Visayas and Mindanao have also one project each in the pipeline, he added.
“Multipurpose ito. Kasi dito rin manggagaling yung inumin natin. Dito rin manggagaling yung kuryente natin. So, kailangan natin ng malalaking dam,” Visaya said.
He disclosed that only 62 percent of the country’s 3.1 million hectares irrigable areas are so far irrigated.
“We cannot stop from constructing big dams and reservoir,” he said in a press briefing at the dam site.
Visaya noted that the inter-agency task force against the coronavirus disease has granted NIA to continue implementing projects amid the pandemic, owing to the importance of the agency’s role in food production.
Nagaño and Pajarilla, for their part lauded NIA for the Upper Tabuating SRIP saying this will uplift the lives of local farmers.
Pajarillaga said the number of people involved in illegal logging activities in this town has dramatically decreased since livelihood projects were introduced, including the planting of trees and bamboo in huge spaces and ancestral domains.
Bote said they have been planting trees in the dam’s watershed area since December and has set up measures to protect them.
The P878-million Upper Tabuating Small Reservoir Irrigation Project will irrigate farms in Barangays Nazareth, Rio Chico, Bago and San Mariano in the municipalities of Gen. Tinio and Peñaranda, Nueva Ecija.
