Dear Editor,
This is September and the weather is still dry with little or no rainfall in the rice-growing regions and interior locations. The Ministry of Agriculture has formed a task force to deal with irrigation issues to ensure adequate water is available to farmers.
The worst affected areas will be the Essequibo Islands since they depend on rainfall and sweet water for irrigation. Many acres could be lost because of the lack of irrigation water and the continued dry spell. The Minister of Agriculture should have been advised earlier by all the rice-growing regions about the effect of the El Nino phenomenon, which is now taking its toll. The Guyana government should have sought help from an El Nino expert, to suggest ways to combat the present crisis.
Learning from this experience some emergency measures should be put in place to alleviate the irrigation problem. These include:
(1) supplying irrigation water on a schedule to farmers served by the Dawa Pumping Station and the Boerasirie Conservancy;
(2) installing a seven-door sluice in the main canal at Coffee Grove to stop the wastage downstream so the higher lands can get access to water by gravity flow;
(3) empoldering Burn Bush road at Tapakuma to hold the level of the water in the canal;
(4) putting back the speedboat system to run regulators.
Major schemes like Mahaica/Mahaicony/Abary, Tapacuma, Boerasirie and Black Bush were designed to create more production and better irrigation for farmers.
Yours faithfully,
Mohamed Khan
