MANILA, Philippines—The recent flooding and landslides brought about by Storms “Ondoy” and “Pepeng” underscore the need for local monitoring systems and technologies that can help people efficiently respond to the threat of disasters.

Amid climate change and extreme weather events, in which storms are expected to be stronger and more erratic, vulnerable communities in both upland and low-lying areas are the first to be devastated by flooding and landslides. This situation is exacerbated by grave environmental problems related to large-scale mining, logging and dam construction.

Grassroots sectors can build their capacity to respond to these threats by using scientific knowledge and locally available tools.

Inexpensive rain gauges

The Center for Environmental Concerns-Philippines (CEC-Phils) is sharing its experience in setting up simple and inexpensive rain gauges as a community-based adaptation technology and practice.

The rain gauges are examples of monitoring tools which poor and disaster-prone communities can potentially benefit from, if properly used and managed by local organizations.

CEC-Phils is a nongovernment organization founded in 1989 through the initiatives of organizations representing fisherfolk, farmers, indigenous peoples, women, urban poor and professional sectors.

It closely works with communities and organizations nationwide, supporting their initiatives to nurture their ecosystems, defend their common access to natural resources and eventually improve their living and working conditions in the context of a balanced and healthy environment.

Quezon landslides

CEC’s inspiration to implement a community-based rainfall monitoring program came from its disaster-response experience after the widespread landslides and flooding in Quezon and Aurora provinces in 2004.

From 2004 to 2007, CEC mainly focused on relief and rehabilitation work in Real, Infanta and General Nakar, Quezon. CEC also became involved with communities in Rapu-Rapu, Albay, which have experienced landslides and disturbances related to mining and erratic weather.

In the course of the rehabilitation and advocacy work, CEC and local organizations realized that landslides or floods would be a long-term risk in these areas due to adverse natural factors and the people’s socioeconomic standing. Thus, the next logical step is to prepare the communities for future disasters.

Pilot areas

In 2008, CEC and its local partner organizations discussed possible disaster-preparedness efforts at the grassroots level. Among these was the setting up of rain gauges in selected barangays in General Nakar in north Quezon and Rapu-Rapu as part of local early-warning systems for communities. CEC also considers this a form of support to ensure the communities’ greater access to information on the environment.

The pilot areas were chosen based on the following environmental and socioeconomic considerations.

Presence of geo-hazards. There are significant hazards in the area. The target barangays are located within steep and small watersheds which are prone to landslides and flash floods.

Rainfall, the usual triggering factor for landslides and flash floods, occurs almost all year round. Reduced forest cover due to clearing and logging aggravates the hazards. The landslide and flash-flood hazards are illustrated by the impact of Typhoons “Winnie” (2004) and “Reming” (2006) in General Nakar and Rapu-Rapu, respectively.

High poverty rates. The communities are vulnerable to the hazards primarily because they are poor. In General Nakar, farmlands buried during the 2004 disaster have yet to be fully recovered and cultivated. Decreasing fish catch in Rapu-Rapu, believed to be caused by mining operations on the island, resulted in lower incomes for most residents.

Presence of community-based organizations. There are people’s organizations at the barangay level which are committed to helping communities address the hazards and to assisting CEC in implementing the program.

Partners

In General Nakar, our partner organizations are Samakabay (Mahabang Lalim), Kiday Community Farmers’ Association (Pesa) and Sikap at Tiyaga (Minahan Sur)—all local chapters of the district-wide North Quezon Farmers’ Association.

In Rapu-Rapu, CEC works with the barangay chapters of Sagip-Isla, Sagip-Kapwa and Umalpas Ka-Bicol.

Initially, CEC identified three barangays from each municipality as pilot sites for the program. Training sessions were held and rain gauges were installed in Barangays Carogcog, Tinop-an and Mananao in Rapu-Rapu, and in Barangays Minahan Sur, Pesa and Mahabang Lalim in General Nakar.

Later on, CEC responded to the request of the local organization in Rapu-Rapu to conduct the same training and install rain gauges for Barangays Buenavista, Viga, Linao and Poblacion.

Small watersheds

CEC’s rainfall-monitoring program is designed for areas in small watersheds where it is safe to assume that rainfall is uniform over the whole area. Our method does not apply to very large watersheds where rainfall is likely to vary across the whole area.

Take, for example, a barangay on the plain and a nearby river which originates from the mountains several kilometers away. If heavy rains fall in the mountains while the plain has a cloudless sky, upstream flooding may already be happening and racing downstream without the barangay residents knowing it because their rain gauge reads “zero” rainfall.

In this case, a network of rain and stream gauges is necessary. The principle is the same, but the data interpretation is more complicated. This also involves a lot of logistics and coordination work across barangays and even municipalities or provinces. Such constraints limited our work to small watersheds.

Training adult learners

CEC believes in the capacity of people to learn and contribute to significant changes if given the opportunity. CEC designed the training so that those who have basic literacy and numeracy skills can still qualify for the training.

The local language is used as much as possible. The training process is also designed to recognize and use indigenous knowledge whenever advantageous.

The training is given primarily by a CEC team which has the expertise not only in the field of disaster management but also in training and organizing grassroots communities in environmental education and basic science and technology.

Training modules are designed by CEC in consultation with members of Agham (Advocates of Science and Technology for the People) and other volunteer scientists and engineers.

The rain-gauge program includes a basic orientation on community-based disaster management (CBDM), rainfall-monitoring training (RMT), a one-year rainfall-monitoring work, monthly project monitoring, data analysis and results validation in cooperation with the communities.

CEC’s rain-gauge design was adopted and slightly modified from the standard manual-rain gauge and is similar to the rain gauges presented in Talk of the Town on Oct. 18 by the University of the Philippines National Institute of Geological Sciences (NIGS). General Nakar and Rapu-Rapu each received nine rain gauges from CEC.

Preparedness committees

The rain-gauge project is part of a whole range of community-based disaster-preparedness efforts. The CBDM training provides the framework and context for the RMT. CEC also includes an exercise on community-based mapping of resources and hazards which will be useful for disaster response.

The output of the CBDM training is the formation of a disaster-preparedness committee (DPC) of each organization/barangay, which is also in charge of the rainfall monitoring. The DPC is not directly under a local government unit. While the DPC plans and conducts its own activities, it also coordinates with local authorities such that their efforts complement each other.

Community-based disaster-management-training sessions were conducted in the last quarter of 2008 and the first quarter of 2009 in the pilot areas. Participants and graduates of the training formed DPCs in the project barangays in Rapu-Rapu and General Nakar. This was followed by training on rainfall monitoring and the use of rain gauges in the second to third quarters of 2009.

The training sessions were conducted indoors in community-learning-and-service centers and outdoors in the immediate surroundings where the rain gauges were installed. Grade 6 students of the Minahan Elementary School also attended a similar training.

The training that followed sought to equip the DPCs with knowledge and skills for using rain-gauge technology. RMT builds the capability of DPC members to measure rainfall (See sample data sheet below.). A solid understanding of the principles and procedures of rainfall monitoring ensures the quality of rainfall data.

Data gathering

Currently, the program is still in the research phase and is in no position to issue warnings to save lives.

A one-year monitoring work is being conducted by the communities in order to identify rainfall episodes which cause landslides and/or flashfloods. It also serves as an evaluation of the on-the-job performance of DPC members in charge of monitoring. At this point, it is emphasized to the communities that the monitoring work is for “calibration” purposes only and not for issuing warnings.

The collected rainfall data will be analyzed by the community, with technical guidance from CEC, to determine which rainfall parameters can trigger landslides and/or flash floods.

Rainfall events can now be identified as “safe” or “unsafe” and warnings can now be issued with some degree of confidence. These critical rainfall values will be validated in the second year through monitoring work. More data will help in fine-tuning these values and increasing the degree of confidence in issuing warnings.

While the program focuses on the warning system, it should be complemented by effective communication and evacuation systems.

Lessons learned, shared

CEC encourages the adoption of similar technologies whenever possible and appropriate to local conditions.

To ensure success, such program should harness the support and commitment of local communities. There should also be a good number of scientists and engineers who have the appreciation of and commitment to teaching at the grassroots level. Of course, money matters. But the core of this program is the strong linkages and coordination among environmental advocates, scientists and communities.

In the larger context of building grassroots capacity to respond to climate change, we also encourage the sharing and dissemination of these efforts among NGOs, people’s organizations, and scientists and environmentalists.

The rain-gauge project was among CEC’s contributions to an exhibit of community-based climate-change technologies and environmental-education materials titled “Addressing Climate Change Impacts Through Asian People’s Actions and Appropriate Technologies,” held from Sept. 29 to Oct. 4 at the Oct. 14 Memorial in Bangkok, Thailand. It was also exhibited from Oct. 2 to Oct. 4 at the Wat Benchamabophit School in the Thai capital as part of the People’s Action on Climate Change.

Public awareness

The exhibits were aimed at generating more public awareness and appreciation of grassroots and people’s local initiatives in response to the threats of global warming and its impact.

People throughout the Philippines and other vulnerable countries face larger challenges ahead, with the literally changing climate. We have seen how communities remain resolute and determined to struggle for their rights and defend their natural resources because at stake is not only their present but also their future.

With climate change aggravating other environmental problems due to globalization, we should strengthen the capacity of communities to respond to disasters.

Community-based disaster response, monitoring and mitigation such as the example above can be undertaken as part of the adaptation strategies of the poor who are most vulnerable to global-warming induced events.

(Ricarido Saturay Jr., a geologist, is program coordinator for the training and community services unit of the Center for Environmental Concerns-Philippines. Also a member of Agham, he is a Master of Science candidate at the University of the Philippines National Institute of Geological Sciences.)