A week after heavy rainfall caused severe flooding in Region Three, a number of places are still inundated, particularly Canal Number Two, West Bank Demerara where approximately 300 residents and farmers are still knee deep in water in their farms.
Other communities like Patentia and Goed Fortuin have seen floodwaters drain off but they are still dealing with the effects of flooding. For the farmers in Canal Number Two, this meant the farms that they depended on for their livelihoods were affected and cannot at this time provide them with an income or food for their family.
Additionally while there is no income to look forward to from their crops, they have been thrown into further expense.
An eighty-one-year-old pensioner of North Section, Canal Number Two, Lalchan John, sells his produce at the Stabroek Market.
“The pepper done dead already, the papaya done dead already. The banana suckers in the back, I gon have to clean them and throw manure for them to survive”, the elderly man told Stabroek News yesterday. It’s a task he has to undertake with his wife as the two live alone. John is also a cattle farmer. He said that he had to walk his cows through waist-high water in the backdam looking for areas that are high enough for them to graze. This water has since receded to knee height.
Meanwhile, in the front part of his yard where he planted his citrus trees, they are all surrounded by water. The water was higher a week ago. The nearby trench across from John was nearing the top while empty plastic bottles and other garbage on the other side at a culvert prevented the draining of water faster.
He noted that both Saturday and yesterday were sunny days and hopes the weather stays this way so that he could return to caring for his farm and animals. However, with the weather forecast predicting rain for July into August, John added, “Well if it fall back plenty, abee done again”.
Nisha Persaud is one of the residents in North Section who was affected by flooding. Yesterday though most of the water had receded, water was still lodged in the back of her yard while all of her farmland remains inundated. She shared that among the affected crops were banana suckers, citrus plants, lime, cassava, avocados, pepper, tomatoes, celery, boulanger, squash and bora most of which died as a result of flooding.
Persaud said that last weekend when the rainfall was heavy, the downstairs of her house was in half a foot of water resulting in them having to put their appliances on a table out of the water. She and her husband hired someone to put in cement blocks in the doorways before bailing the water out of their house.
For the several hundred residents living along the conservancy dam in Canal Number Two, they are all said to be flooded. Residents are also worried about the water in the conservancy as of yesterday as it was at the brim and possibly overtopping.
The yard of Latchman Ramkissoon was surrounded by floodwater and a bridge leading out of the yard, across a four-foot drain to the conservancy dam was partially submerged. Ramkissoon said that while most of the water has receded, the water came as high as a foot and a half. Their farm is currently in more than two feet of water, the resident said.
The man shared that they had a much larger farm and once reared cattle, ducks and chickens but after they lost much of it in the 2005 Great Flood, they no long rear farm animals. Then, they were compensated fifty thousand dollars, said Ramkissoon. Their loss is far less this time, he added.
Ganesh (only name given) was on the Conservancy Dam awaiting a boat. He noted that his parents who are in their seventies lived more than a mile away on the dam and he was going to pay them a visit to see how they were affected since his visit last week.
The last time he visited them, their entire bottom house was submerged and the water had reached their ankles while in the backdam, the water reached their knees. They planted avocados, granadilla, cassava, bitter gourd (carilla), banana and plantain which his mother would sell at the Stabroek Market.
At the time this newspaper visited, three excavators were being transported to Canal Number Two.
Meanwhile, in Patentia, residents were no longer in floodwater and the water in the drains and trenches were no longer overtopping and were flowing through the koker. Councillors from the Neighbourhood Democratic Council (NDC) according to residents of Two Field, Patentia had visited them and distributed food hampers.
At Goed Fortuin, water stains left behind showed how high the water had reached in the community. Goed Fortuin resident Wilfred Smith pointed out the chair set and stove he kept in the bottomhouse that were affected by the waters. The mattress of a bed that a friend of his would sleep on whenever visiting was still wet. The floodwaters he noted had reached a foot and half and two feet in some areas where his furniture was.
