TUGUEGARAO CITY – At least 386,000 hectares of drought-hit rice and corn farms would benefit from the cloud seeding operations in the Cagayan Valley region, an agriculture official said Friday.
Dr. Roberto Busania, technical director for operations and extension services of the Department of Agriculture (DA) 2 (Cagayan Valley), said they had cloud seeding operations in Alicia and Echague last week and has scheduled those in other areas to drench 231,000 hectares of corn farms and 155,000 hectares of rice farms.
"The cloud seeding will help recover crops under the vegetative and flowering stages," Busania added.
He said that while rains are expected in August, weather forecasters have observed the “below normal” rainfall.
In the past months, the Philippine Air Force – Tactical Operations Group and DA-2 used up 25 sacks of salt in their cloud seeding operations, said Air Force Col. Augusto Padua, tactical wing commander of PAF-TOG 2 in Cauayan City.
Using a Nomad -22 airplane from Mactan, Cebu, the cloud seeding operations would amount to 10 hours this week. (PNA)
