Bad weather phenomenon leaving folk high and dry in Sarawak

Stephen Then The Star 8 Mar 10;

MIRI: The worsening drought caused by the El Nino weather phenomenon has wreaked havoc in rural farmlands across interior Sarawak, causing crop failures from the central to the northern region.

Harvests of subsistence crops, especially padi, have dropped to about only 30% of normal yields.

The weather is said to have affected many settlements in the mountainous regions of Bario and Bakelalan in the northernmost interior of Limbang, Ulu Baram and Ulu Tinjar in Miri Division and also throughout territories in central Sarawak.

On Friday, Bakelalan assemblyman Nelson Balang Rining visited Ulu Merario in Bario where rivers and padi fields were said to have dried up.

He said the harvest this year was especially poor compared with previous years.

“The problem has worsened over the past month,’’ said Balang

“Residents in the highlands are complaining of shrinking padi supply,” he added.

Balang said the drought had affected even places located on the mountains, with the temperature surging to abnormal levels in the highlands.

Alarms bells are also ringing in Ulu Baram and Ulu Tinjar where farmers are desperately seeking help to buy rice from urban centres after the padi supply from their farmlands began to dwindle.

Long Panai community leader Ding Laeng said that people in almost all settlements had reported poor padi harvests.

“We have to go to Marudi town just to buy rice because our farms are not producing like they did in previous years. The weather is especially dry this year,” he added.

In central Sarawak, the situation is bleak in the settlements in the heart of Belaga district in Kapit Division.

Several settlements located deep inside timber concession zones, eight hours from the Bakun dam, have to rely on outside help to replenish their padi supplies.

The people from Long Abit and Long Kajang near the Sarawak-Kalimantan border had sought help from the Catholic Church in Belaga.

Belaga Catholic Parish priest Rev Father Sylvester Ding said he had sent 5,000kg of emergency rice supplies to the two settlements with trucks provided by the timber companies.

‘‘I heard other settlements are also in need of urgent rice supplies. They cannot cope because of the crop failures,” he said.