Twenty-one solar pump irrigation projects funded by the National Irrigation Administration were finished in the Cordillera Administrative Region last year.

Nineteen of these completed SPIPs are currently benefiting a total area of 253 hectares with 365 farmers.

Nine SPIPs, on the other hand, are located in the Province of Abra, seven in Kalinga, two at the West Apayao Abulug Irrigation System, and one at the Upper Chico River Irrigation System-Mallig, in Isabela province.

These irrigation projects had a total allocation of P106.9 million under the NIA’s Establishment of Groundwater Pump Irrigation Project funds.

Meanwhile, two solar projects were also completed in Apayao and Kalinga, which had an allocation of P30.87 million from the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program-Irrigation Component funds. It now covers a total area of 87 hectares of farmland.

According to NIA CAR regional manager Benito Espique, Jr., SPIPs are usually installed in areas with a higher elevation than the source of water, or in areas where the nearest possible source of water is underground.

The NIA said that 23 SPIPs were completed in 2022.

Meanwhile, President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. earlier expressed the government’s plans to build thousands of solar-powered irrigation units to boost farmers' palay harvests.

“We will install solar power to operate the pumps. We are looking at it, and it will help immediately because we import maybe 3.5 million metric tons of rice every year,” he said in a ceremonial palay harvest in Pampanga early this February.