Hot summer coming soon

By Herbert Vego

BASED on the projection of the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (PAGASA), summer is expected to start before the end of this month, bringing high temperatures, with the peak occurring between the second half of April and the first half of May.

However, PAGASA also warns of the possible visit of El Niño to our country by the second half of 2026, with potential for severe, hotter, and drier conditions.

We know that El Niño is no merciful saint, as it refers to a long rainless period or drought due to climatic aberration.

As of today, the Amihan (Northeast Monsoon) in the Philippines is weakening and transitioning to a warm and dry season.

Since 2010, the onset of the dry season has typically been announced in the third or fourth week of March. On three occasions, the dry season was declared only in April.

Incidentally, in April 2025, the day-time temperature rose to more than 40° Celsius in  some areas.

The positioning of various weather systems around the country and the rising temperatures are among the parameters PAGASA uses in assessing the transition.

This we learned from a news report based on a TV interview with Ana Liza Solis, chief of the Climate Monitoring and Prediction Section of PAGASA.

Here in lloilo, we have yet to hear from the provincial agriculturist, Dr. Ildefonso T. Toledo, who is recognized for leading agricultural initiatives in the province, including livestock interventions, farm mechanization, and fisheries conservation.

But the last time I talked to Dr. Toledo, he revealed that while the cyclical El Niño phenomenon occurs every three to five years, it does not linger long enough to paralyze agricultural productivity. In fact, it has already been 21 years since 2005 when El Niño crippled our rice production.

Three years later in 2008 was when La Niña – a long, rainy and stormy season — came and brought typhoon Frank that devastated Iloilo City and neighboring towns with floods up to six feet deep.

Toledo said that the El Niño/La Niña climatic succession in diverse places is just one of the four impacts of global warming that desperately ache for solutions if we have to survive. The others are: sea-level rise, temperature rise and rainfall variability.

But as the saying goes, “When the going gets tough, the tough get going.”

Thus, Toledo suggested, the best way to prepare for the worst in summer is to plant alternative crops – say, mongo — that hardly need water to grow.

We have also to brace ourselves for the discomfort and possible ailments that summer heat brings.

If the rains come late in June instead of the usual May, then the rice farmers would plant only in July.

The intolerable heat that hits the Philippines way past the summer months is also traceable to our dwindling forest cover that is probably only 10 percent of what it used to be. Logically, if we could regain the lost forest ground, then we would regain our cool, breezy environment.

We agree with Toledo, who debunked the notion that the culprit behind global warming is carbon dioxide.

“It’s a half-truth,” said Toledo. “If there’s an excess of it, then planting plants is the solution because plants need carbon dioxide to survive. And with more plants imbibing more carbon dioxide and giving off more oxygen, we human beings and animals enjoy cleaner and fresher air. To solve the imbalance, let us balance nature.”

-oOo-

NO PRICE HIKE YET FOR MORE POWER 

THE skyrocketing prices of gasoline and diesel will not affect the rates of electricity in Iloilo City in the present billing cycle of MORE Electric and Power Corp.

“As much as possible, we keep our rates down.”

So said Justin Luna, the company’s supervisor for energy sourcing, when interviewed by Angel Tan on the radio-TV program “MORE Power at Your Service.”  It will only slightly influence the April billing, though, because of higher transportation cost.

Some households may even enjoy lower bills because of the cold nights that enable them to save on air-conditioning consumption.

The residential rate of MORE Power at present is PHP 11.68 per kilowatt-hour, the lowest in the region.

The reason is because MORE Power sources most of its power supply from renewable energy, such as coal, geothermal and solar plants.

Lunar advised his audience to stimulate stable power supply and minimize use of electricity in order to stabilize rates.

Under the law of supply and demand, as in most products and services, prices rise when demand is greater than the supply.