Whether the weather be fine
Or whether the weather be not…
We’ll weather the weather
Whatever the weather,
Whether we like it or not.
The ditty above, with its play on weather/ whether must surely by now be the theme song for farmers in the Mahaica, Mahaicony and Abary areas on the East Coast Demerara/West Coast Berbice. At present, many of them may perhaps be contemplating rain dances and what not, caught as they are in the throes of a prolonged dry season.
As this newspaper reported on Tuesday, some of the farmers who grow rice had, in desperation, blocked channels to secure water to irrigate their fields. Rice is grown in fresh water. None of the advanced technology or research into crops done to date has found another way to grow rice. Therefore, a prolonged dry season spells trouble for rice unless fresh water is made available for irrigation.
Sources in the know say that of the three areas, Abary is possibly the only one that may be okay because it has a conservancy nearby to supply water. Mahaicony and Mahaica rice farmers both depend on rivers for their irrigation needs and while Mahaicony’s situation is middling difficult, Mahaica is the worst off, sources said.
The reason is possibly because the Mahaica River is lower (more depleted) than the Mahaicony and may therefore have a higher salt content. The rivers depend on rainfall and the resultant water flowing down from the backlands to keep salt levels at a minimum. In the dry season salt water backflows from where the river meets the sea and can cause severe damage to rice in particular, but other crops as well. Farmers know that the risk of salinating their fields is perhaps worse than allowing them to go dry; dried fields can be re-irrigated, but those damaged by salt water need much more work and money to make them useable again.
This time around, the farmers are not blaming the authorities. On Monday, Shahid Jameer, a rice farmer said pragmatically, “Who we going to blame, brother? They don’t have water and if they don’t have water then they can’t give us water.”
In the rainy season, the reverse occurs. These same farmers are the recipients of much, much more water than they need or could use. Water flows down from the high lands in torrents and with rainfall already drenching the coast, there is nowhere for it to go. Once the conservancy level reaches a certain high point, the water has to be released. For decades, the major release route was the Mahaica, Mahaicony and Abary channels, which invariably overtopped inundating farms.
While extreme dry weather might not occur every year, the rainy season is an annual occurrence. And while the degree of flooding varied annually, depending on the amount of rainfall, climate change has seen it develop to a point where relief was past necessary. Several concepts were floated, but eventually the authorities in the past administration decided that building a huge canal and eight-door sluice at Hope, East Coast Demerara was the answer. There are also two other smaller existing structures to complement it.
Whether this will be enough to save the farmers in the event of severe wet weather is yet to be seen. Guyana has so far not yet experienced the likes of the torrential rainfall that contributed to 2005’s Great Flood. However, given the extreme weather of recent, we should not count on it not happening again in the near future.
If the Hope Canal does not prove sufficient, farmers in the Mahaica, Mahaicony and Abary areas will be counting their losses for the umpteenth time. Whatever the weather and however the farmers weather it, the authorities should take some of the flack for the damage done. Better preparation for both wet and dry weather should be a matter of routine by now. These are the only two weather conditions that affect Guyanese and while they are expected to have some impact, the risk of losing crops and livestock annually should have been minimized to almost nil by now. Hopefully, that goal is now in sight.
