When a problem gets TOO BIG, the solution is to proverbially douse it with water, just like what you do in stopping a fire from spreading.
Right now, the Duterte administration is fighting head-on a gruesome bloody war on drugs, which is now catching fire and threatening to become a conflagration.
Duterte’s critics are crying foul over the spate of killings, now hitting over a thousand, and the emergence of problems like human-rights abuses and threats on democracy and the rule of law. But on the other extreme, supporters cite the success of the campaign, with over 600,000 surrendering, including 35,000 drug pushers, thus confirming earlier estimates of about 3.7 million Filipinos involved in drugs. Duterte apologists also note that the killings and robberies in previous administration that were drug related were allegedly even worse in numbers and in intensity, as they were more heinous and even victimized innocent civilians and families.
Poverty breeds crime and drugs. Either way, we have a problem of “damnation proportions,” but what is apparent is that most of the victims, as well as the suspects, of these crimes come from poor families. They resort to drugs, being mostly jobless, and are, thus, vulnerable to the temptation of money. Also plagued with too many economic and social problems, they acquiesce to peer pressures and resort to drugs as a form of escape, until they get hooked. And to finance their cravings, they resort to theft and robbery, and being already psychologically disturbed, even end up in heinous crimes.
If poverty or being idle and jobless is a major cause of criminality, then let’s address poverty that breeds crime. Records show that the worst poverty is in the rural areas. The National Statistical Coordination Board noted that in 2012, Lanao del Sur recorded the highest poverty incidence of 68.9 percent; Kalinga-Apayao, 59.8 percent; Eastern Samar, 59.4 percent; and Maguindanao, 57.8 percent. Metro Manila’s urban poor recorded a poverty incidence of only 3.8 percent.
It is actually the widespread poverty in the countryside that is causing massive rural-to-urban migration, and triggering the steady rise in urban-poor population and all the attendant problems, like housing backlog, juvenile delinquency, prostitution, criminality and drugs and other social malaise, all combining into what may be called social “damnation.” The same joblessness and lack of opportunities are what also trigger some to seek greener pastures abroad, and explaining why there are now close to 12 million overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) abroad.
Dams you must do, damned if you don’t. One sure strategy of solving this so-called social damnation over the medium and long term is building thousands of minidams or catch basins—virtually making the Philippines a “dam-nation,” or a country of dams.
Minidams or catch basins can solve multiple problems. For one, they help boost agricultural productivity, as these catch basins can harness rain that can be used for irrigation. This will be good in bailing out the agriculture sector, which has been performing dismally the last few years.
In remote mountain regions, these catch basins can serve as ready source of water for house use, or even drinking water, provided it is treated or boiled.
Third, with the presence of catch basins or minidams, surrounding areas become more fertile for agriculture, vegetable gardening and even miniforestry or orchard fruit-tree farming. Fourth, these minidams or catch basins can also be used to raise fish, which helps solve hunger and low productivity in the countryside.
Moreover, building minidams or catch basins is good for the environment as the best climate, adaptation strategy, as it helps capture and harness rains, which is good during droughts but also prevent soil erosion, and the cascading of water into flashfloods downhill.
And because the returns are manifold, why can’t national government, the local government units, the private sector and civil society launch a massive campaign to build hundreds of thousands of minidams or catch basins, even if it would only take pick and shovels, but this will, at least, create millions of jobs, similar to what US President Fraklin D. Roosevelt did when he created 4 million jobs in a month’s time at the height of the Great Depression in the 1930s, according to Nick Taylor in his book entitled When FDR Put the Nation to Work. If we can’t build these mini dams, then we will be damned getting back to our problems at square one.
Importance is too big. It is often said there are three things more important in agriculture. One is water. Second is water, and the third is water. All the others, like fertilizers, planting varieties, etc., only come after water.
Thus, constructing small water- impounding projects, reservoirs, catch basins or minidams is very strategic and vital in agriculture and attaining productivity, and subsequently jobs and livelihood opportunities in the countryside. Indeed, records show that even without fertilizers, yields are better with irrigation.
These catch basins are also strategic, as you can now teach farmers how to fish literally like hito, dalag or tilapia, for consumption, as well as for sale to the market as a livelihood. The fish, which feed on larva, can also prevent the spread of mosquitoes and ailments, like dengue.
More important, the jobs created in the construction frenzy, if done seriously, and the agricultural and aquaculture productivity generated will, indeed, help eradicate poverty in the rural areas, among farmers and fisherfolk. And even if these minidams and catch basins are poorly built with inferior linings, the water seepage can still contribute to the surrounding soils and underground aquifers with its unintended drip irrigation.
In short, let’s try to nip in the bud criminality and the damnation of the drug menace by addressing the problems before they even emerge—in agriculture where two-thirds of those living below poverty reside. As we have discussed earlier, damn it’s so simple—let’s just build dams all over the nation.
E-mail: mikealunan@yahoo.com