ALOR STAR: The Kedah government today sought assistance from the Agriculture and Food Industries Ministry and the National Security Council (NSC) to carry out repair works on the collapsed irrigation canal in Pelubang, Pokok Sena.
Menteri Besar Datuk Seri Muhammad Sanusi Md Nor claimed that failure to carry out the repair works immediately would harm the livelihood of 40,000 padi farmers in the state.
Sanusi said it was crucial for the ministry and NSC to ensure that the new structure to replace the collapsed bund would prevent recurrence, since the matter involved national food security.
"Now is the time for the padi fields to be irrigated and the incident has delayed the process to supply water to the padi fields concerned.
"Should the repair works not be completed within two weeks, 13,350ha of fields will be affected, which in turn will put a risk to the farmers' ability to produce some 66,750 tonnes of padi.
"Having said that, the state government hopes the ministry and NSC would pay immediate attention so that this matter can be resolved immediately," he told reporters after chairing the state executive council weekly meeting at Wisma Darul Aman here today.
Sanusi said the state government was seeking assistance from the federal agencies as the repair works cost was higher than the RM1.8 million estimated earlier.
"The cost to build a stronger and better structure to replace the collapsed bund section is much higher than between RM1.5 million and RM1.8 million estimated earlier.
"Since this matter involves national food security, we are calling for the ministry and NSC to step in," he said.
In the 12.15pm incident on Monday, the irrigation canal bund structure belonging to Muda Agricultural Development Authority (Mada) in Sungai Santap collapsed following heavy rainfall in the Sungai Padang Terap water catchment area.
The incident led to over 30,000 accounts under Syarikat Air Darul Aman (Sada) being affected by water disruptions after several water treatment plants (LRAs) were forced to be temporarily shut down.
Sanusi added that the focus now was on getting the water level at the Terusan Tengah irrigation canal back to normal, so that the Pokok Sena LRA could be operated at full capacity.
He said once the water supply to the 38,500 affected accounts were restored, the focus would be shifted to irrigate the padi fields.
"The Pokok Sena LRA is still out of operation after the incident while the Jenun Lama LRA is only operating at 70 per cent of its capacity," he said, adding that the other two LRAs in Bukit Pinang and Jenun Baru were already operating at their full capacity.
#kw Kedah, Menteri Besar, irrigation canal, bund, collapsed, Mafi, NSC, Mada, Sada