28 Cebu barangays under state of calamity amid El Niño

Twenty-eight mountain barangays in Cebu City have been placed under a state of calamity as the province continues to suffer from dried creeks, dead crops, and cracked farmlands due to the sustained onslaught of El Niño.

The declaration was made last Wednesday following the recommendation of the city’s Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council in a resolution dated 18 March.

The council cited a report from the City Agriculture Department that 50 percent of the city’s production areas appeared to have soil cracks due to a lack of water, affecting 506 farmers and 115 hectares of crop areas.

Water crises

On Monday, Cebu City Mayor Michael Rama declared a water crisis in the city due to the adverse effects of extreme heat on his community.

"[This] is an emergency. I will now declare crisis on water,” said Rama.

An underground river also exhibited a continuing decrease in water level where residents of barangay Sudlon Uno source their water.

“Our farmers were really affected. Their projected income for this year was lost,” Councilor Joel Garganera, chairman of the council's committee on DRMM, said in an interview.

The local government unit mulls using P96 million from their quick response funds to address the city’s current crises.