The Philippine News Agency (PNA) said in their latest release that the local officials and residents of Maguindanao and North Cotabato hailed the order of President Rodrigo Roa Duterte to immediately dredge Mindanao’s vast marshland – now heavily silted.
The 220,000-hectare Liguasan Marsh usually overflows and inundated low-lying communities surrounding it in Maguindanao and North Cotabato every time weather disturbances occur in the provinces of South Cotabato, Sultan Kudarat and Bukidnon.
According to PNA, rivers from these provinces flow toward the marshland before exiting to the Moro Gulf via the Rio Grande de Mindanao and Tamontaka Rivers.
Abdulah Abudatu, a farmer in Datu Piang , said he hopes that the dredging plan would begin soon as weather disturbances outside Maguindanao continue to affect farmers in Datu Piang.
“We catch flood waters from other provinces, we always end up the losers,” he said.
Another farmer, Eusebio Malan of Barangay Lower Inas in M’lang, North Cotabato, added that the government’s plan to dredge the marshland would surely improve his productivity.
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