The Philippine government is seriously considering the big and costly plan of constructing massive dikes to fend off serious flooding in Metro Manila and its neighboring areas. This I personally believe is a very good, important and valuable project. But before embarking on this costly project, it is necessary for Filipino engineers to consult Dutch engineers.
Can you believe, one-third of the land area of the Netherlands is reclaimed from the sea and is below sea level. Schiphol Airport in Amsterdam is 11 feet below sea level. But because of Dutch ingenuity in building massive dikes, there is no flooding in the Netherlands.
I visited Rotterdam and Amsterdam and, at times, strangely enough, in the vicinity of these two cities, you can see ships passing through wheat fields. The fact is they are sailing along elevated deep canals that cross the wheat fields.
It is not enough to build dikes. You need powerful pumps in strategic places to pump out water in case of emergency. Waterways that exit into the sea should be constantly dredged. There should be a big penalty imposed on those constructing structures on these waterways; as well as on those discharging wastes into the rivers, estero, creeks, canals and waterways.
A visit to the Netherlands Embassy in Makati by our engineers and planners will be a good beginning. They will get initial valuable information.
—RAYMUNDO T. SABIO, MSC,
Prefect Apostolic of
the Marshall Islands,
haeyangrts@yahoo.com