PALACE PUSHES MASSIVE WATER, POWER CONSERVATION / 'NOT A FISH STORY'
MANILA, FEBRUARY 15, 2010 (STAR) President Arroyo has opted to push for massive water and power conservation as well as long-term projects instead of exercising her emergency powers to address the spreading shortage of the two vital necessities, Malacañang said yesterday.Deputy presidential spokesman Gary Olivar issued the statement as rotating blackouts and rationing of water from dams and irrigation facilities have been reported in the Visayas and Mindanao amid the dry spell that hit agricultural lands hardest.
Olivar said he does not see the need for such emergency measures as the water and power situation is not expected to be severe for Mrs. Arroyo to allow concerned agencies to undertake legal shortcuts to address the shortages.
He said most of the power producers are privately owned and are doing everything to make sure their operations remain efficient.
“From what I see, all the elements are in place and they’ll be working (power plants) so I don’t see any scenario that needs legal shortcuts,” Olivar told government-run radio dzRB.
“This is a problem of building long-term power supply and power generation capacity in our country due to our growing population and now we have El Niño.”
To prevent the situation from worsening, Olivar said the public must conserve water and electricity.
MALAYA BUSINESS INSIGHT HEADLINE NEWS:
No need to use emergency power for looming power crisis: Palace BY JOCELYN MONTEMAYOR MALAYAA Malacanang official said Pesident Arroyo is unlikely to exercise her emergency powers in case of an electricity shortage in Luzon.
Deputy presidential spokesman Gary Olivar, in an interview with Radyo ng Bayan, said that on top of contingency measures by adopted by both government and the private sector, long term measures like putting up more power plants or rehabilitating and improving existing ones are being explored.
He added that there is also an ongoing campaign for the public to conserve water.
Olivar said there is no need to use legal shortcuts to address power concerns since private power plant owners and operators are cooperative enough and are exhausting all means to avoid massive power supply shortages. He said rotating brownouts are part of measures to efficiently use and conserve energy.
Olivar stressed that the government remains on top of the situation and is closely monitoring developments.
He said Task Force El Niño headed by the Department of Agriculture is assessing the impact of the dry spell on the supply of water both for household use and power generation.
OTHER MALAYA BUSINESS INSIGHT HEADLINE NEWS:
This is not a fish story By AMADO P. MACASAETThis is not a fish story. This is a story about fish that gives the stockholders of Saranggani Aquaculture Corp. at least one billion pesos a year in exports and domestic sales.
The company has grown to be the biggest aquaculture operation in the Philippines such that 80 per cent of its annual gross revenues come from exports to the United States, particularly the West and East Coasts.
It has expanded its market to Canada and is making a grand entry in Italy and the United Kingdom in the European Union.
Nicasio Alcantara, eldest child of Conrado Alcantara who ventured to Mindanao in 1956 from Pasay City believing that tenacity to an objective need not be accompanied by money to succeed, told Malaya Business Insight in an exclusive interview that his father started the fishing business as a hobby in a pond of their home in Cotabato.
After making a neat pile in lumber and seeing that the family could not lend its hands in the denudation of the forests, the Alcantaras went to agriculture and fisheries.
They knew that the rapid deployment of Filipinos as workers in many countries is a big market for fish – bangus or milk fish in particular.
Saranggani Aquaculture exports bangus - deboned, marinated or smoked (tinapa). The company knows that Filipinos working abroad hardly have time to clean the fish, least of all debone them.
The Alcantaras knew that from the market the bangus should go straight to the frying pan. That helps create higher demand. Labor saving is always in their minds.
Today, Saranggani Aquaculture has a 300-hectare fish pond and a similar size of ocean coves where they have fish cages.
Not content with big incomes from exporting bangus, the company is going into high value fish such as apahap and lapu-lapu.
It might appear that fish cages are less expensive to operate but not really so, according to Alcantara. He explained that the red variety of lapu lapu grows fastest in waters at least 30 feet above the bottom of the sea.
So the nets have to be pulled up carefully for the fish to be fed and sunk back at least 30 feet deep. That is an expense, Alcantara pointed out.
The corporation does not really want to corner the aquaculture business. It wants to grow even bigger but this time with the participation of small people.
The expansion includes breeding of bangus fry which are otherwise caught in the open sea using crude methods. After Saranggani started production of fry, the size of which is smaller than a match stick, the price came down from P1.25 apiece to as low as P0.25.
The nearly 90 per cent reduction enables the small fish pond owners to make a little more money. But their ways are far from scientific.
Besides, Alcantara explained, the crude method catches fry of all kinds of fish. Mortality in all is high. That, he said, also reduces the fish in the seas and oceans.
So the Alcantaras began thinking of what chicken and hog breeders are doing. They will go into contract growing. The company will provide the fry and the feeds. The contractor must have the pond to cultivate the fish.
They are guaranteed a price that leaves them comfortable profits.
The operation of the contract growers will be under the constant watch of fish technicians or scientists so that no missteps happen along the way.
The rapid multiplication of people in the world and global warming are reducing the volume of fish in the oceans and seas.
The so-called hunters, big businessmen who have large fleets of fishing and refrigerated vessels roaming the seas for fish, also make the supply get scarce.
The hunters have big refrigerated boats where the catch is kept for months. The smaller boats catch the fish with many methods except hook and line. Most common is large big strong nets cast where they believe there are schools of fish. The refrigerated boats are moored in the oceans and seas for months. They come ashore only when the vessel is full or nearly full.
Like Saranggani Aquaculture, the hunters export their catch to many countries of the world. Bangus is not their bread and butter.
Seeing the effects of all these, the Alcantaras decided to go big in aquaculture to become the biggest among the big players.
The problems encountered by the hunters and the big investments in aquaculture have a telling effect. Today, Alcantara said, about 30 per cent of many varieties of fish, particularly bangus and pompano, are supplied by commercial fish pond operators.
The export market is there to tap. The Alcantara’s have not seen a decline in demand for bangus.
That should be so, bangus being the favorite fish of the Filipino, at least those who have a little more beyond galunggong which now costs P120 a kilo, according to surveys of the Department of Trade and Industry.
Chief News Editor: Sol Jose Vanzi
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