When we went in search of De Hoop, Mahaica rice farmer Moorlia Ganschiana just over a week ago, we were told that he had gone fishing. We found him eventually, expertly casting his net into the canal adjacent to his flooded rice field. There appeared to be no intent behind his pursuit. Rather, it seemed that he was trying to put the flooding and its effects behind him. In fact, he appeared to have already resigned himself to the losses which the rains had inflicted on his rice crop.
Moorlia agreed to talk with us. Understandably, there were things on his mind … like the $300,000 he had to “fork out” to meet the cost of hiring an excavator to de-silt the canal that runs adjacent to his rice field. After that, he had spent another five days, with the aid of a tractor, draining the land. These were not costs that he had initially factored into his envisaged financial outlay and he knew that somewhere along the line the impact of the flood would kick in, impacting on his savings. The use of the tractor had meant further expenditure of around three hundred gallons of fuel. He wondered aloud as to whether there was no provision through which he could recoup at least some of that cost from government.
