Water, water everywhere but not a drop someday

Time may not be too far off when clean, safe and affordable drinking water will be a scare commodity, as the country’s supply of freshwater resources are slowly being badly degraded due to man-made environmental crises and the twin evils of economic and political interests.

This alarming state of affairs is contained in a booklet situationer entitled "Saving Our Future" prepared by the Center for Environmental Concerns-Philippines, a cause-oriented institution focusing on the country’s environment struggles.

Echoing the warning forwarded earlier by the World Bank (WB) and the Asian Development Bank (ADB), the situationer noted that the country has 1,907 cubic meters of freshwater available yearly for every citizens, the second lowest among Asian countries.

Still, the ADB pegs the annual per capita water resources of the Philippines at 4,800 cubic meter, the seventh lowest in Asia.

How is this possible when the country has bountiful freshwater resources?

The whole of the archipelago enjoys 421 principal rivers, 69 lakes, over 100,000 hectares of freshwater swamps and four major groundwater reservoirs astride four major river basins for a combined total area of about 50,000 square kilometers.

Potentially, it said, the Philippines has 226,430 million cubic meters of freshwater resources. Rainfall also showers the country with a yearly average of 2,500 milimeters of rainwater, according to the National Water Regulatory Board (NWRB).

The sad part, however, is that only two out of five Filipinos do get water from formal sources and only 65 percent of the population is able to source water for domestic consumption. Adding misery to the accessibility problem is the issue of whether the water that is coming from formal distribution systems are safe for drinking, the WB noted.

Among others, report pinpointed the issue of privatization as one culprit in the growing unavailability of water, where "a supposedly public resource is priced beyond the reach of common folks, while becoming the domain of profit-seeking enterprises."

The environmental factors of water pollution, drought, siltation of rivers, depleting underground water sources and the extent of environmental degradation nationwide is bringing the water situation to the level of a crisis and an urgent environmental concern.

Consider, for example, the 2004 report of the Environmental Management Bureau (EMB), which said that only four rivers in Cebu, Davao City, Davao Oriental and Apayao and a lake in Benguet are the remaining reservoirs where water is safe enough to drink after simple disinfection.

This is an increase, however, from the 2002 EMB survey, pinpointing only three bodies of water found to contain water suitable for drinking. The increase was brought about by an expansion in water bodies.

Water from these bodies are classified as Freshwater AA, the topmost potable class among freshwater resource grouping made by the National Standard for Drinking Water (NSDW).

However, since these water bodies are mostly located in remote uninhabited watershed areas, their exploitation will most likely result to watershed degradation, which is already happening in some of these rivers, especially those located in logging concession areas.

Supplier of the Freshwater A class, comprising of source water that requires complete treatment form coagulation, sedimentation, filtration and disinfection, number about 192 water bodies.

There are 140 Freshwater B class or water bodies suitable only for recreational bathing and swimming; 226 for Freshwater C class or water bodies fit for fishery propagation, navigation and industrial water supply for manufacturing processes; and 19 water bodies for Freshwater D class or water appropriated only for agricultural irrigation, livestock maintenance and industrial cooling supplies.

If the country’s 158 major rivers are to be taken into account, none of these water bodies is safe for drinking, the situationer, quoting the DENR, said.

In addition, 51 percent of all water bodies classified by the EMB are polluted and do not meet effluent standards set by the DENR.

At least 16 rivers have been classified as biologically dead due to direct waste dumping into these rivers, industrial and agribusiness wastes and large scale extractive activities like mining, logging and dam construction.

The National Statistical Coordination Board (NSCB) also reported that groundwater, the water stock from under the earth, monitored a 26 percent depletion from 242,148 million cubic meter in 1992 to only 179,210 million cubic meter in 2001.

The depletion was primarily caused by the increased groundwater demand by industries, which jumped to a high 55 percent demand in the period covered.

On the other hand, domestic demand for groundwater slightly increased by 20 percent in the same period.

Adding to the issues of domestic and industrial demand during the survey period, environmental misfortunes wrought further havoc on the depleting groundwater resources.

The highest recorded groundwater depletion was during the El Niño episode in 1998 when 7,631 million cubic meter were depleted, followed by 2001 with 7,593 million cubic meter of depleted groundwater source.

Unless stopped and re-oriented, the Center for Environmental Concerns-Philippines warned that the government’s policies on water will more surely bring about a crisis worse than is already prevailing.