Philippine water use efficiency improves

MANILA, Philippines — The country improved its economic use of water resources last year, driven by sustained economic growth, data from the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) showed.

The PSA reported that the country’s water use efficiency (WUE) in 2023 rose by 5.6 percent to P222.81 per cubic meter of water used from P211.05 per cubic meter in 2022.

The WUE measures the efficiency of an economic industry’s use of water resources by dividing its value-added with the volume of water it uses.

The services sector accounted for the highest WUE at P1,377.21 per cubic meter of water used followed by the industry sector at P441.04 per cubic meter of water used, according to the PSA.

The agriculture sector posted a P15.81 per cubic meter of water used WUE last year.

The country’s total water abstraction, or the volume of water removed from its source either permanently or temporarily reached 226.33 billion cubic meters, relatively flat compared to the  226.03 bcm recorded in 2022.

The PSA said 98 percent of the total water abstraction last year came from lakes, artificial reservoirs, rivers and streams while the remaining 2.3 percent flowed from groundwater reservoirs.

“In the same year, 98 percent of the abstracted water was for own use, while the remaining 1.9 percent was intended for distribution to other economic units,” the PSA said.

The PSA explained that abstracted water can be either used by the same economic units that abstracted it or could be distributed to other economic units.

The country’s water expenses last year reached P178 billion, nearly 17 percent over the P152.2 billion recorded in 2022, the PSA added.

“Water expense was highest among households at P70.88 billion. This was followed by MQMC (mining and quarrying, manufacturing and construction) water expenses amounting to P52.53 billion,” it said.

“Other industries, composed mainly of services, came in third, with water expenses amounting to P45.98 billion,” it added.

The PSA takes into account both the physical and monetary flow of water resources to capture their economic significance.

The physical flow describes the volume of water that flows between the environment and the economy while the monetary flow shows the economic value of the used resource both at its point of origin and destination.

The latest report of the PSA only focused on surface water and groundwater abstraction due to data unavailability on other water sources like soil water, desalinated seawater and harvested rainwater.