Rice families fear floods
ABOUT 40,000 Battambang rice-farming families already suffering steep losses from a severe drought are at risk of seeing their crops wiped out entirely by devastating floods as late seasonal rains start to kick in.
A drought that meteorologists have blamed on the tailend of an El Niño weather cycle has already damaged rice crops planted on more than 49,000 hectares in the province, the heartland of Cambodia’s rice production.
And while rains have started to fall in parts of the province, the dry spell’s total damage could top even last year’s record-setting drought, which saw 60,000 hectares of the province’s rice-planted fields wither under the baking sun.
“The drought [damage] is going to be more serious than last year’s if the coming weeks do not bring sufficient rain,” Prom Voek, an official in Battambang’s provincial agricultural department, said yesterday.
About 1 million people live in Battambang, with most dependent on agriculture for their livelihoods, he said. Eight of the province’s 13 districts have been severely affected by the drought.
“On average, one family holds at least 1 hectare of rice fields, so we can estimate that about 40,000 farming families have been impacted by the drought,” Voek said. “All the CONTINUED
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