The State of Water Resources in the Philippines

This paper sought to provide information regarding the water resources in the Philippines, focusing on the issues of water quality, status of water use and water scarcity, and other threats to water availability. Although the country has sufficient amount of water resources, it was found out that water availability is still threatened by some major water resources problems: increasing water demand due to drastic growth in population, water resources pollution, droughts and flooding and weak institutional framework to address these problems. Water quality problems include increasing groundwater and surface water pollution. Moreover, drought and flooding have also increased damages in recent years due to deteriorating watersheds and high economic and population growth. In relation to these, the Government enacted national laws to define and deal with water control and quality management. The objective of this research was to present and evaluate current conditions and issues on Philippine water resources.