An $86.6M mobile hydraulic pump was commissioned at Hope, East Coast Demerara (ECD) yesterday by Agriculture Minister Robert Persaud.

A release from the Government Information Agency (GINA) said that the new system will supplement the functioning of sluices which have been the traditional source of drainage.

The pump is one of two stationed at Hope and Greenfield to serve those and neighbouring communities. The two hydraulically-driven drainage pumps were procured by the Ministry of Agriculture through the National Drainage and Irrigation Authority (NDIA) which contracted the MWI Corporation of the United States.

The release said that installation of the pump took four months. The pumps are mounted on a mobile skid, fitted with 36-inch discharge pipes and 350 horsepower engines. They have the capacity to discharge 560 gallons of water per second.

Persaud said that mobile pumps have proven to be the most efficient way of responding to drainage needs and has been the method used in other countries faced by natural disasters. The effectiveness of this system in Guyana, he noted was realized during the 2005 floods.

“We have to intervene in this way because we are below sea level and we can only open sluices at low tide. This restricts the amount of hours we can actually do drainage