Rice crops not badly affected by floods, says Mada

Thursday December 20, 2007

ALOR STAR: The waters of three rivers in Kedah were well above the danger levels as at 3pm yesterday but the state's rice crop was not in danger, according to the Muda Agriculture Development Authority (Mada).

Sungai Kuala Nerang was at 17.99m (danger level 17.07m) Sungai Kepala Batas at 4.33m (2.8m) and Sungai Jeniang at 27.47m (25.91m).

The floods, however, affected only 1.2% of the100,000ha of Mada padi fields, the authority's deputy general manager (technical) Loh Kim Mon said.

He said a total of 1,230ha of Mada padi fields in Kubang Pasu, Kota Setar and Pendang were submerged in floodwater.

Flood damage: Kampung Semangat Umno head Mustafa Ibrahim (second from left) and several villagers inspecting the village multipurpose hall which has been under water for over a week. The villagers were evacuated to the Penor Prison hall near Kuantan.

“There is a big possibility the padi plants will recover if the weather is fine. This is because the flooding is not due to floodwaters from upstream but because of direct rainfall.

“When the rain stops, the excess water will drain out through existing irrigation canals,” he said yesterday.

Mada deputy general manager (agriculture) Hamid Mat said the agency had taken measures to ensure excess water was speedily drained out.

In Johor, the flood situation continued to improve, with only 1,963 victims in 31 evacuation centres.

At 4pm, Muar district had the most number of evacuees with 971 in 10 centres, followed by Segamat with 942 victims in 20 centres.

There were another 50 victims in a centre in Batu Pahat.

All roads were passable except Jalan Pogoh-Tekam near Sungai Labis in Segamat, which is only open to heavy vehicles.

Meanwhile, a landslide forced the closure of Jalan Yong Peng-Parit Sulong until Jan 12. Motorists can use Jalan Tongkang Pechah-Jalan Parit Jalil as an alternative route.

In Pahang, evacuees at relief centres yesterday were down to 18,542 from 21,363 on Tuesday.

A spokesman of the state police flood operations room said there was a drop in the number of evacuees in the flood-hit districts, except Pekan, where the number rose to 9,370 from 9,313 on Tuesday.

Maran had 2,907 evacuees, followed by Kuantan (1,096), Rompin (1,992), Pekan (9,370), Bera (1,582) and Temerloh (1,595).

The main road linking Pekan and Kuantan at the 19th kilometre, the eighth kilometre of the Rompin-Muadzam Shah road, Jalan Kuantan-Segamat and Jalan Temerloh-Triang were still closed to all vehicles.

In Kelantan, the water level at Sungai Golok receded to 10.13m from 10.17m.

A Kelantan police flood operations room spokesman said the number of evacuees at the 28 relief centres had dropped, except in Tumpat, which showed a slight increase from 2,322 to 2,356.

There were still 6,491 flood evacuees in Pasir Mas, 17 in Kota Baru and 10 in Tanah Merah.

He said Jalan Pasir Mas-Rantau Panjang at13th kilometre and Jalan Tumpat-Pengkalan Kubor, which were under 0.5m to 1m of water, were still closed to traffic.

The 65th km of Jalan Gua Musang-Kuala Krai and the alternative old Kota Baru-Jeli-Dabong-Meranto-Gua Musang road were also closed to traffic because of landslides.