Senator Juan Miguel Zubiri is pushing for an upgrade of the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration (PAGASA) to ensure accurate and timely weather forecasts and to enhance disaster preparedness and management.
Zubiri emphasized the need for better weather forecasting technology during the Senate finance subcommittee hearing on the 2025 budget of the Department of Science and Technology (DOST).
“This is a failure of us to inform the people about the weather, and it is a failure of us, as a government, to warn them about the geohazard areas,” the senator from Bukidnon, who will be defending the DOST budget in plenary, said.
He cited the 2024 World Risk Report identifying the Philippines as the most disaster-prone among 193 countries.
The country’s insufficient weather forecasting capabilities have consistently contributed to the loss of lives during typhoons and other natural disasters, lamented Zubiri.
Inaccurate weather warnings, he also said, often lead to unnecessary class suspensions that may have an effect on the education of children.
“It really boggles the mind, and it happens a lot, that school is called off on a particular day, tapos napakainit sa labas, walang ulan. This has an adverse effect on the education of our students, and on the economy as well,” according to him.
With wrong weather assumptions, Zubiri said work in national and local government as well as in some private companies can be suspended for several days, which can lead to loss or reduced productivity and adversely affect the economy.
Zubiri noted that PAGASA operates with limited equipment – only 11 of its 19 Doppler radars are functional, a critical tool for tracking rainfall, typhoons, and thunderstorms.
This lack of equipment hampers its ability to provide precise weather information, he said.IMT
