Philippines installs first solar-powered irrigation system

May 29, 2018

DAVAO CITY - The Department of Agriculture installed the country’s first solar-powered irrigation system, paving the way for rice farmers to explore three cropping season in a year.

Agriculture Secretary Emmanuel Piñol turned it over on May 22 to the Manubuan Small Water Impounding System Association (Manubuan SWISA).

The project cost P6.5 million and is located in Barangay Manubuan, Matalam, North Cotabato.

The agriculture department said Piñol who conceptualized the project and commissioned the making of the prototype in M'lang, North Cotabato. The prototype was inaugurated by President Rodrigo Duterte in February 2017.

The solar-powered irrigation system could irrigate as wide an area as 40 hectares. It draws water from a creek beside the former rain-fed rice farms using a 15-horsepower Lorentz surface pump from Germany, it said.

The water drawn is pumped to a reservoir capable of holding 350 cubic meters of water and then distributed to rice fields using pipes with valve heads which are opened to irrigate the fields.

The system could irrigate four hectares in one day and could theoretically cover a 60-hectare area in 15 days.

Manubuan SWISA President Tranquilino Pulanco said that the operation of the SPIS would allow them to plant at least twice a year.

Pinol said 116 more units are being built in other areas of the country and he expected these to be completed this year. DMS