We barely escaped Ondoy’s waters in Metro Manila on Sept. 26, because we took the 10am PAL flight from Manila to Laoag. The rains started pounding as we were boarding the plane, and after an hour of bumpy ride, we were met by strong winds at the Laoag International Airport. When, after 24-hours, we saw on tv the massive flooding in the country’s capital, I thought, “that was close.” Well, not really, because a week later, it was our turn, when typhoon Pepeng (international code name: Parma) came to lash at the northern Luzon provinces. For twenty-four hours or more on Oct. 4, we endured rains and howling winds so strong the house shook. We suffered the typhoon’s wrath for more than a week because Pepeng couldn’t make up its mind whether to leave or linger, some other typhoon was blocking its way out of the country. Almost the entire province of Pangasinan was submerged in water; other places suffered the same fate. For a while, northern Luzon was cut off from the rest of the island. Here in the province, electricity and all other utility services were down for several days. There was nothing else to do except read with candlelight, curse the angry wind, shake my head in disbelief at the damage to life and property caused by the back-to-back typhoons, and ponder on why all these came to be.

Except for the damage to crops, minor flooding in roads, inconvenience of downed public utilities, and the debris left behind, there was not much loss of human lives reported in the province. Those elsewhere in the island, however, were not as lucky. People blamed the floods in Metro Manila, which claimed many lives, on global warming, clogged sewers (due to too much and improper waste disposal) and unexpected heavy rainfall. (The floods in Pangasinan and some Central Luzon provinces are arguably attributed to the simultaneous release of waters in several dams.) Then there were the landslides in the Cordilleras, which killed hundreds, and the number of dead will probably rise as more bodies are recovered. A friend of mine relayed how they are reminded of the 1990 earthquake at the sight of too many deads in funeral parlors in Baguio. I was there during the big earthquake and I get anxious about what my friends could be going through right now – the city is running low on fuel, food supply – and coffins! – due to impassable access roads to Baguio. Again, I wonder how we, in Luzon, ended up with such misfortune.

I can’t stop thinking about how the uneven development of the regions in the country can somehow be found at the root of these recent calamities. With economic development concentrated in the national capital region and its surrounding provinces, people from underdeveloped parts of the country naturally gravitate toward urban areas in search of jobs. Because many of them are unskilled, however, they end up living in makeshift homes in squatters, along railways, and under bridges, vulnerable to the elements and man-made disasters. Right now, scores in Manila continue to live in evacuation centers while authorities are at a loss as to where to relocate thousands who live in slums and along flood-prone areas, many of which are still underwater. Migration to the nation’s capital has caused urban population to swell, thus, pressure on the supply of livable land. The problem of dense urban population became acutely evident in the days right after the flood. Thousands of people scrambled for relief goods while local government units could hardly cope with the huge demand for social services in evacuation centers – just watching news on tv was depressing. The same can be said of now-overpopulated Baguio. In a mountainous area where houses are seen clinging on mountain or hillsides or precariously perched on hilltops, houses being buried in landslides are a yearly occurrence. However, the magnitude experienced after the recent typhoons is indicative of excessive pressure on the environment from urban population explosion.

The widespread disasters in Luzon spawned compassion and generosity among people, with cash and goods streaming into charities for distribution to those in need. But this won’t and shouldn’t go on indefinitely. Solutions with more lasting impact should be formulated. To mitigate disasters like these, it’s time to fully harness the potential of the balik-probinsya program, accompanied not just by social safety nets but also incentives to investors to build businesses in underdeveloped regions to create jobs, which, in turn, will encourage people to go back to the provinces. With the forthcoming national and local elections however, it’s easier to reach out to millions of indigent voters when they are in the neighborhood. Politicians might soon forget about disaster-mitigation, solutions with long-term effects, and instead focus attention and resources on palliatives, like dole-outs, to ease the suffering brought about by the disasters, thereby wasting an opportunity to solve serious social problems attendant to rapid urbanization. I hope not.

Related posts:

The Shakertown Pledge on Earth Day
A vote for the earth,  a vote for myself
Enough with plastics
March to save the earth
Help stop global warming

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