Published September 27, 2019, 4:12
PM By Ali Macabalang
COTABATO CITY – A joint project will introduce solar-powered sources of
water for drinking and irrigation in all remote, off-grid and island
communities in Minsupala – an old tag for Mindanao, Sulu archipelago and
Palawan.
The Mindanao Development Authority
(MinDA) and an Israeli agricultural firm, in collaboration with the Department
of Interior and Local Governments (DILG), have agreed to design a technical and
financial plan to provide Minsupala villages with water supply and desalination
plants powered by solar energy.
Dubbed the Mindanao Rural Water
Supply Program (MinDAWater), the project is espoused by MinDA Chairman
Secretary Manny Piñol and DILG Secretary Eduardo Año following an arrangement
with the LG Group, an international agricultural firm.
In a statement, Piñol said the
project will be funded with an initial $500-million loan which could be
accessed by local government units at concessional rates through local banks.
“We are designing a new scheme in
the financing of LGU projects where they could access loan funds through a
partnership between the foreign funders and local banks,” he said.
Last Wednesday, the MinDA chief and
his technical staff met in Davao City anew with officials of the LR Group, and
discussed the details of the program.
The LR Group is the same entity that
offered to build 6,200 units of solar-powered irrigation systems with a backup
financing payable in 15 years with a three-year grace period, a MinDA statement
said.
It established two proto-types of
solar-powered irrigation units linked to a computer system and equipped with a
“fertigation tank” in Lumban, Laguna, when Piñol was secretary of the
Department of Agriculture, the statement said.
As soon as the financial and
technical package of the MinDAWater program is finalized, local government
units all over Mindanao and Palawan will be invited to the roll-out and project
implementation scheduled this year.
The MinDA administration has
identified water, along with power and rural infrastructure, as the “most
urgent need of Mindanao and Palawan” to increase productivity and address
health concerns.
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