A TOTAL of 110 hectares of the 592 hectares of land planted with tobacco this year in Alcala and another 50 hectares in San Fabian were affected by drought caused by the El Niño phenomenon.

This was confirmed by Roger Madriaga, manager of the National Tobacco Administration (NTA) in Pangasinan, who said 18 percent of the total area planted with tobacco this year in Alcala alone was damaged.

Alcala and San Fabian are just two of the biggest tobacco-producing towns in Pangasinan.

Madriaga said affected by lack of water were tobacco lands that were planted beyond the January 15 cut-off date of planting tobacco.

He explained that farmers only have October to December, had until January 15 as the cut-off date to use irrigation, failing that, the farmers run the risk of having no water to save their plants in their early growing stage.

Farmers who managed to harvest their crops were advised to have an air curing shed to lessen the effect of the excessive heat of the sun on their crops while he warned farmers that too much rain during the coming rainy season can kill their crops, especially if they are already harvestable. (Kim  Gealogo)

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